Happy Growl 2025
Retro-styled soul-searching from artiste who crosses frontiers of Americana and rocks on down the road.
Till I Turn Blue
You have to look closely at the artwork of Peggy Janes’ albums to see what’s going on behind the scene of her songs, before actually embarking on a ride through the lady’s latest records. Try not to be fooled by the abstractness the kilt-like front of 2020’s "Paint Still Wet" or the urban façade 2021’s "The Parade" offered, then, because the straight lines demonstrated there didn’t mean the Milwaukeean’s melodies and lyrics were straightforward. The same rule must figure in the understanding of “Till I Turn Blue” whose cover’s curlicues don’t mean Ms James is beating around the bush now when it comes to her emotional state, and if a certain shape should suggest a love triangle, there’s enough intrigue in Peggy’s seventh platter to suggest one can hide between her tunes. And the tunes of this longplay reach far and wide to embrace not only country-pop the chanteuse’s listeners love but also rockabilly and other ageless genres.
Not that the dozen pieces on display sound pretentious as if to hint at the songstress’ attempt to secure her legacy; on the contrary, it’s all so seemingly unassuming as to feel universally arresting. James may approach the subject matter of these numbers in the third person and distance herself from their heroines, yet Peggy’s infectious vocal delivery and the muscular twang of her and her husband Jim Eannelli’s guitars on the elegantly rumbling “Compensation” which opens the proceedings or the swaggering “Loneliest Girl” which sits in the middle of the album show the artiste’s deeply relatable sympathy to the characters she’s conjuring. And while the heart-tugging “There Must Be Gold” and “Stuck On The Track” opt for Appalachian pining, and “A Walk With You” blends the ’60s girl-group sensibilities with prairie-expansive sadness, the riff-driven “So Over You” evokes the kind of rockabilly Wanda Jackson would approve of, and the ’70-flavored, slider-caressed ballad “First Kiss” marries drama to bluster most effectively.
Still, it’s the platter’s Texan-spiced title track that, pretending to be deadpan but instead burning hot, packs the mightiest punch, with an exquisite six-string solo elevating Peggy’s passion to good heavens, especially when preceding the acoustic “O. Winston Link” which paints a portrait of a famed photographer whose images are so akin to those James’ songs capture here. So when “Isn’t Anybody Coming?” brings the album to a close by posing a question, you’d better answer “Yes!” and join the chorus.
*****
