Broadly speaking, you might call Ruth Theodore a singer-songwriter, but as her previous releases attest, she’s as much a narrator and crafter of melodies as anything else. ‘Cactacus’, recorded in collaboration with Todd Sickafoose, renowned for his work with Ani DiFranco, continues this tradition.
‘Buffalo’ kicks off the album in an uptempo, jaunty country style, with some nifty slide / pick guitar work. The stompalong ‘Scavengers’, like many of the album’s other tracks, exists within the realms of US country, but brings a unique slant in its shaping, changing direction unexpectedly in the mid-section to a piano-led ballad. Her idiosyncratic approach to lyric-writing is nowhere more evident than on ‘The Carcass and The Pride,’ in which she presents the two objects as an analogy for a relationship.
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Elsewhere, the jazz-infused ‘Man of the Land’ exemplifies her unusual approach to arrangements and the way she plays her instruments. It all makes for an album that’s admirably wonky and also intelligent and entertaining.
Ruth Theodore Online
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