You have to separate the art from the artist. How they behave is one thing, but what they produce is everything else, be it the tiny swirled mini-grooves left by paintbrush bristles or the locked-in groove that pins a rock song’s beat to a wall of sound.
Shelby Lynne is without a doubt a major and authentic talent. And in her case, you really can’t separate the artist from the art. If ever there were a performer who lives through her music—and brings her music to life—it is Lynne, who has a way of getting you to cry in her beer. Though she stops just short of qualifying as a chameleon, or engaging in musical flightiness, she certainly knows her way around a genre. There’s a sneaky double meaning in putting it that way, too, because Lynne never ever goes dead center. She takes a genre and pulls it by the neck just close enough to take what she needs, whether it’s a kiss or a kiss-off, and at the very same time she won’t take any lip. Musically, though, she gives back more than she takes. Lynne is always finding new comfort zones and, even better, new ways to step outside them. Her ever-growing musical roots comprise as much silky soul as full-moon country. She’s been commercial and she’s been rebellious. From dusty country to Dusty Springfield (as in her great, Phil Ramone-produced Just a Little Lovin'), Lynne has consistently proved to be the captain of her own stylistic destiny. That’s where Revelation Road—her most personal album in a career full of personal albums—seems to be leading. And as if therapeutically, Lynne appears to be sorting out her spiritual priorities from a distressing tangle of wrecked love and newly found hope.
At times, in her own inimitable way, she evokes everybody from Bob Dylan to the ‘70s singer-songwriter phase of Jimmy Webb; even the cool twang of the calm-before-the-storm early Eagles. Some songs have a shivery sparseness that evokes John Lennon in the days when he set up a stripped-down blues groove and sang bravely around the edges, as if they were glass shards. In Revelation Road, Lynne has written an album that manages to be soothing and melancholic in a single breath. Her melodies are instantly familiar (as her own), which renders even her most rawly served pain palatable. The title track—and by the way, more albums should open with the title track instead of tucking it away somewhere on side two—is hypnotic and tuneful. “The Thief” cracks the lock of her heart. Reflectively, she confronts him; and then admits her own willingness to become a thief—or anything else—if that’s what it takes to bring back the wanted criminal of her love. “Toss It All Aside” continues the theme of having to jettison one’s dreams—to ditch just about everything you ever wanted and believed you would have. Throughout Revelation Road, it’s not only the lyrics and music that are brilliant—in a single breath Lynne displays the slow-burning resonance of a torch singer and the forlorn ache of a female Hank Williams.
Shelby Lynne performs at the Old Rock House as part of its "Listening Room" series January 12 at 8:30pm; doors open at 7pm. Tickets are $32 reserved, $20 general admission. For more information, go to oldrockhouse.com/shelby-lynne or call 314-588-0505.
