Berg returns to recording after 14 years
Monday, February 14, 2011 – Matraca Berg returns to recorded music with her first disc in 14 years with the rootsy "The Dreaming Fields" on May 17 on Dualtone.
Berg's last disc was "Sunday Morning To Saturday Night."
"I knew when I was writing these songs, the ones that I was drawn to... that they deserved to be heard... They where a bit deeper and darker than a lot of what's happening, so I knew it was up to me," Berg said. "I'd done some shows with various girlfriends, and when you look at the women - and the men - in the audience, I realized these stories I'm writing are their stories too... So, making sure they get to them became important to me."
Berg, who scored her first number 1 at 18, has had songs recorded by Dixie Chicks, Patty Loveless, Trisha Yearwood, Gretchen Wilson, Linda Ronstadt and Dusty Springfield.
"I was raised on 'Harvest' (Neil Young) and 'Blue,' (Joni Mitchell) 'Pieces of the Sky' (Emmylou Harris)," she says, " That's the sound of my childhood. When I started writing these songs, I pulled them out - and it struck me how bare they were and driven by feel. The songs floated on the arrangements, and the vocals were all the emotions the songs had come from. It's so far from what we hear now, but everything I wanted this record to be."
More news for Matraca Berg
CD reviews for Matraca Berg
The Fields
Matraca Berg's new studio album is not so much a country project as it is a musically varying collection with a noticeably decided sense of place. The feeling of knowing where one belongs is expressed with the piano and strings ballad A Cold, Rainy Morning In London In June, where Berg truly feels like a homesick tourist, and also comes out during Oh Cumberland, a song about a famous Southern river that continually calls her home. These are highly personalized songs from the woman that won a »»» |
Lying to the Moon And Other Stories
Though she hasn't logged a lot of air time on country radio as a singer, Matraca Berg is a familiar name to most of today's country singers. Berg is one of the most successful country songwriters of the 1990's, writing smashes like "The Wrong Side of Memphis," "Strawberry Wine" and "That Kind of Girl."
Her latest CD is a re-issue of some of her best, but lesser-known, creations from previous albums, ranging from the tender title track and "Back When We Were Beautiful" to the more raucous and »»» |
Sunday Morning to Saturday Night
Deana Carter built her career on two Matraca Berg-written singles, the CMA Single and Song of the Year "Strawberry Wine" and "We Danced Anyway," and now after two brilliant but unsuccessful albums on RCA, Berg has resurfaced on Rising Tide. With Emory Gordy Jr. producing, an all-star cast of musicians and singers performing, and Berg writing and singing every song, this album deserves to be a huge hit.
"Good Ol' Girl" is a tribute to the truck-stop waitress who "serves up the biscuits and gravy »»» |
Editorial: Walking the talk –
When names like Hank Williams, Johnny Cash, Waylon and the Hag are invoked, you're talking hard core country. These are the touchstones of country , the guys who made country music what it was and still is (or maybe can be). When these folks would sing about being down-and-out and the rough-and-tumble, they knew of what they were singing about. Fast forward a few years to the country singers of today. »»»
Concert Review: Steve Earle doesn't rest (on laurels) –
If you didn't realize Steve Earle had a new disc out, "The Low Highway," it would have been no problem realizing that quite and quickly.
That was because Earle started the two-hour show with three straight tracks from "The Low Highway," and he would not be done for the night. The title track of was a midtempo effort... »»»
Concert Review: The Howlin' Brothers leave the radar behind –
The Howlin' Brothers - this trio, in reality, contains no brothers - are about eight years into their career and on their fifth album. To say they've been under the radar screen may be an understatement. You couldn't even say they've been flying under that screen because they have stuck very close to their Nashville environs.... »»»
|
|
Country News Digest
 CST
 CST
Elsewhere in the news
Currently at the CST blogs
Some folks listening to Kelly Willis and Bruce Robison's new duet album, "Cheaters Game," may well exclaim, 'Well, it's about time!' after finally hearing these two talented country singer/songwriters recording music as a pair for the first time. Willis has built quite a following for her independently-minded feminine perspective, while Robison has written hits for the Dixie Chicks ( Travelin' Soldier) and Tim McGraw and Faith Hill ( Angry All the Time), as well as penning the ultimate Willie Nelson tribute, What Would Willie Do? and recording it as a solo act.
... »»»
Last fall, singer/songwriter Steve Forbert dropped the 14th studio album of his 35-year career, the impeccable "Over With You." Critics recognized the album as a return to the form Forbert displayed on his earliest works - 1978's stripped back and personal "Alive on Arrival" and 1979's more lushly produced and commercially accessible "Jackrabbit Slim" - but the fact is that Forbert has never strayed far from their basic folk/rock tenets.... »»»
Over the course of the past 20 years or so, Jim Lauderdale and Buddy Miller have both experienced a certain rise in their respective rootsy country profiles. Miller has become one of Nashville's hottest speed dial numbers, as an artist, a guitarist-for-hire (a role he has performed for Lucinda Williams, Emmylou Harris and Robert Plant, among others) and an intuitive producer (he's currently working with Executive Music Producer T Bone Burnett to provide the soundtrack for ABC's "Nashville" television series).... »»»
Wilderness
"Wilderness" is another twisted menagerie of The Handsome Family songs. Once again, husband Brett Sparks sings their songs, sometimes in a bellowing gravedigger voice, after adding music to wife Rennie's lyrics. This time out, each and every tune is named after an animal, insect or other such nature creature. However, Rennie studies animals the way Flannery O'Connor wrote about humans, which is with the weirdness and character flaws in primary focus. »»» |
Love Is Everything
George Strait may have reached his seventh decade, but he shows zero signs of slowing down. In fact, Strait seems to be getting even more consistent as he gets older. Strait doesn't stray all that far from the formula that has resulted in superstar status. First and foremost, that means his sonorous voice is mixed far above the music, a very good thing. »»» |
|
