CD Odyssey Disc 1734: Heather Maloney

I’m settling into a “rest and recovery” weekend with Sheila. A lot of long days at work and multiple commitments and responsibilities has me knackered and so I’m taking a couple of days and recharge the batteries. One of my main sources of recharge is (unsurprisingly) music – here’s the latest on that front.

Disc 1734 is…Just Enough Sun

Artist: Heather Maloney

Year of Release: 2017

What’s up with the Cover?  An annoying little kid (I’ll guess a young Heather Maloney), with the expression that annoying little kids get right before they opine, “I’m bored!”

I know what you’re thinking – that I too was once an annoying little kid who complained about being bored. Gentle reader, this is not true! I sprung fully grown from my father’s forehead. Dressed in a suit.

How I Came To Know It: I discovered Heather Maloney in 2015 when I read an article about her in a magazine (a physical magazine, no less). I loved her album from that year, “Making Me Break” (reviewed back at Disc 1200) as well as the one before that. This was just me buying her latest record based on that past success.

How It Stacks Up: “Just Enough Sun” is only an EP, but I’ve decided at 6 songs and 25 minutes it has enough going on to count. On that basis I have four Heather Maloney albums, and “Just Enough Sun” comes in at #2.

Rating: 4 stars

Rest easy, you’re in the arms of a Heather Maloney album. Whatever kind of bad day or tough experience you are having, Maloney’s voice is a soothing balm for your troubles.

On “Just Enough Sun”, Maloney is up to her usual tack, exploring the twisted and complicated terrain of the human heart with a combination of honesty and optimism.

The record begins with “Let Me Stay,” a songwriting masterclass that ticks all he boxes that make up a perfect Heather Maloney song. The song is an emotional journey of returning to your parent’s house as an adult, and the odd combination of familiarity and detachment when you stay in your old room, this time as a guest.

“Let Me Stay” is structured around key images, chiefly how the paint has changed over the years from when the room was Heather’s, then her brother’s and finally, a place for her mother to keep her artwork and her old Alvarez guitar. The guitar draws Maloney in and ultimately, inspires her to compose this song of love and memory and the deep contemplation of what it means to be a guest, ultimately coming to the conclusion that “even our bodies are places we stay” and then the realization “I am a guest in every room I’ve ever known.”

Musically, “Let Me Stay” has a structure that starts high, stepping down lightly through mostly major chords, creating a pensive feeling that is part nostalgia and part acceptance. The melody leads you down this path as surely as Maloney’s sweet, lilting vocals and the words. It’s a perfect song.

Nothing from here is as good, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t other great moments. Maloney takes a turn to old school country on “Something Worse than Loneliness” a song with a healthy dose of sadness that Maloney still somehow makes comforting and that features some delightful work on the guitar.

Maloney surprised me with “Albert 1 – 5” a song about the first five monkeys we fired into space, from the perspective of the monkeys involved. It isn’t my favourite song, but it did make me feel bad for a bunch of monkeys that died 60+ years ago, which I think was the intent. Mission accomplished for the song. Not for the monkeys, though – none of them survived re-entry.

Sometimes Maloney’s lyrics feel like a Zen master, stories that leave you mulling just exactly what it means, but also convinced some truth has been revealed to you. One of my favourite examples are these lines from “Bullseye”:

I heard a story, a master of archery
Giving a lesson at the edge of the shore
He pulled back his bow to its fullest arc
And with total focus in his mind and heart
He let the arrow free into the middle of the sea
And then he said "bullseye!"

To get really dark Maloney needs an assist from Bob Dylan. On a cover of “A Hard Rain’s Gonna Fall” she gets apocalyptic with an assist from collaborator Ryan Hommel on some well-placed harmonies and first-rate guitar strumming (Maloney is no slouch on the guitar either). The arrangement of the song has a natural build that perfectly matches Dylan’s structure, and Maloney’s big bold delivery fill your heart with all the complex emotions the song demands of you.

Heather Maloney played a concert near where I live in 2018, but it was an overnighter and work commitments prevented me from going. I’ve always regretted missing this show, but even a recorded version of her is a salve against the hard edges of the world, and she remains one of my favourite folk singer-songwriters of all time.

Best tracks: Let Me Stay, Bullseye, Something Worse Than Loneliness, A Hard Rain’s A Gonna Fall