| Miss Fortune - Allison Moorer | |
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Reviewed by Kathy Coleman
Allison Moorer has an absolutely phenomenal voice. She can caress a song tenderly or sock it out with a fist. She can deliver any kind of music and she does it with incredible power and emotion. Her music is rich and real and strong, and her newest album, "Miss Fortune," displays all her masterful talents with style and beauty.
From the sweet opening strains of "Tumbling Down," Allison's smoky vocals wrap around the listener. Her throaty accent tinges the song with a light country flavor, but neither the song nor the vocal are intrinsically country; it's her deep emotion and dedication to the beauty of her music that transcends the genre and style and makes Allison's music extremely rich and delightful. She holds to that standard of beauty all the way to final strains of the last track, the smooth country-blues "Dying Breed."
She writes all but one of the songs on this disc, sharing credit largely with Doyle Primm (who wrote the 9th of 13 tracks, "Mark My Word," and co-produced the album), and wrote "Can't Get There From Here" with master songsmith Bruce Robison. She proves to be as excellent a songwriter as she is a singer.
Allison pays deep and reverent homage to her country roots with such beautiful, dark story songs as "Ruby Jewel Was Here" and vicious, biting, bluesy "Hey Jezebel." Allison tackles songs of several styles with ease and grace, capably going from soft and gentle ballads to bluesy roots tunes without missing a mark. She's got the vocal chops to take anything that can be dished out, her voice at turns elegant countrypolitan to throaty Delta blues.
She can certainly out-sing most of the cookie-cutter pop-country acts overwhelming the market. She rocks a little, she swings a little, she moans the blues; she makes music on her own terms, although there are times when the production seems a bit heavy, a little too "forced pop," which seems jarring at times; too much piano, too much drum or background vocal; not enough unity of vocalist with band (perhaps understandable, considering the vast number of musicians on this disc) but Allison's powerful singing overcomes these flaws and makes the album more than worth the listen.
The elegant wordcraft and superior music, woven together with Allison's magnificent, no-nonsense voice overcomes any and all problems to make this a majestic, impressive, and absolutely delicious work.
Song List:
Sound clips courtesy of Barnes & Noble.
Album cover, used with permission of Universal South.
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