Lori McKenna
Bittertown
(True North)
It’s one thing to sing about hard lives. What’s art is to make them a thing of beauty. Massa-chusetts resident McKenna was already a wife and mother when her music began to blossom. Descriptions of married life depict love alongside a raging at its boundaries. The line “’Cause I’m all you have” in “If You Ask” feels harsh and tender. Arrangements like the stately piano of “Stealing Kisses” make Bittertown grander than most folk, starker than most country and perfectly suited to the sentiments within.
—Doug Taylor
This article appears in Dec 6-12, 2007.
