Opening on the sound of a melancholic cello, the Ft Worth singer-songwriter's album was apparently recorded in her kitchen. If she cooks like she makes music, then dinners round her place must be an interesting feast.
Neruda and the equally cello heavy Dido serve an opening course of minimalist, atmospheric rural chapel folk before Make It The Mountain arrives, shuffling round on a brushed country melody, to be followed by the title track's psych blues jam, the vocals distant in the mix behind wailing guitar and sounding like she's singing to herself.
Production values are largely non existent, but it does give the album a similar down-home cabin feel to the likes of Bon Iver and co as Leonhardt's strength with words and slowly beguiling melodies slowly work their magic.
There are a couple of things you'll need to work at, notably the dissonant, rumbling gospel Let The Wretched Come Home, but there's treasure to be found in the spare maternal themed, trad flavoured Black Madonna and Me And Abigail, both with just Jeff Rady's resonating guitar accompaniment. The broken and destructive relationships respectively fueling the mournful, fiddle stroked backwoods hymnal folk of More Rope and the late night hillside stargazing mood of Line Of Fire provide album highlights, while the acoustic Kerby Lane Jubilee wraps it up in classic early Joni style. Or at least until two further 60s tinged hidden tracks turn up, one which (possibly called 24 Hours) I assume is actually bassist James Bullard singing and one which cuts seems to have run out of tape before the end and which suggests Leonhardt might have some Tanya Donnelly records among her collection.
Mike Davies - NetRhythms (UK)
(Nov 9, 2009)