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| Anne McCue - Koala Motel |
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| Written by Fred Mills | |
 Anne McCueKoala Motel [Messenger] Get It at Amazon  Any great album has at least one of those stop-you-in-your-tracks songs that makes you not just whiff the artist, but taste the emotion, and on Anne McCue's third studio album such a moment arrives with track number seven. "Any Minute Now," on the surface a thrumming, Fleetwood Mac-esque number (hold that thought: McCue's smoky purr can sound uncannily like Stevie Nicks) is leavened by an eerie inkiness, both sonically (a swirly midsong mélange of strings turns hallucinatory amid backwards guitars) and lyrically, dotted by images such as "contagion" and "empires falling," not to mention the apocalyptic tag line "the world will end/ any minute now." The effect, a 180-degree swing from sunshine into shadow is deeply unsettling - and compelling. If that were the only head-turner on Koala Motel the record would still come highly recommended. It's got eleven others, though. The Doors go swamprock on "Driving Down Alvarado," a nocturnal travelogue in which McCue, in a Lizard Queen flourish, pleads with guest vocalist John Doe to "take me down to the place the monsters play." The sweet Cajun-folk lilt of "Bright Light of Day" contrasts with the sinewy roots-pop of "Hellfire Raiser" (fittingly, Lucinda Williams cameos on this tale of a combustible relationship). And both the dark, atmospheric "Jesus' Blood" and a primal-groove cover of Tony Joe White's "As the Crow Flies" will make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck. Backed by an intuitive three-man ensemble that includes co-producer Dusty Wakeman (Williams/Dwight Yoakam), McCue performs as if newly liberated and determined to sidestep earlier critical comparisons to Williams and Bonnie Raitt. She's still best described as an (Australian-born) Americana artist whose fretwork marks her a student of the blues. But Koala Motel is so steeped in tuneful rock classicism that it has all the earmarks of a mainstream break-through. |
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