Mullins rings hollow with 9th Ward
Photo courtesy Vanguard Records
Apparently the Pickin' Parlor isn't so much a parlor as it is a big empty room with an old chair in it. In short, not a parlor at all.
The album under investigation this week is 9th Ward Pickin' Parlor by Shawn Mullins. You may know Mullins, an Atlanta-based singer, who was nominated for a Grammy in 1999 and whose single "Lullaby" was a chart topper back then. The album is a country and blues flavored endeavor that is seemingly carefully crafted to be digestible for commercial radio.
The problem I'm having with this album is that I don't connect emotionally with the songs. I feel like he's singing songs that he thinks are supposed to be sung about and not experiences he's really had.
There's the jealous boyfriend shoots somebody in a rage song, there's the drunk song, the nature song, the gotta have faith song, the anti-war song...and so on. It all seems a little too planned.
It's as if he sat down and said, "I'm gonna write me the perfect song that captures (insert emotion here), that people can relate to." I don't think you can write songs that way. The rule about writing about what you know comes to mind.
An artist has to write about real experiences as honestly as he can and hope that the emotion is communicated to others.
The message might be a mess, it might be contradictory, confusing and who knows what else, but it will be real. It will be that thing we call art, that's hard to describe, but we know it when we see it.
If it isn't real, it better be a real clever trick. We all know magic's not real but still enjoy a magic show. Yet the old quarter-from-behind-the-ear trick won't cut it.
If they are real experiences he's had, then they come off as shallow. For example, on "Talkin' Goin' to Alaska Blues," Mullins generically blames the rest of the world for his problems in cliched categories.
Meanwhile, I'm having a hard time feeling his pain on what sounds like a very expensive flight to what is basically his vacation in Alaska.
On the other hand, one doesn't necessarily need to connect emotionally with a song to enjoy it. There are plenty of songs I love that get my head nodding and foot tapping, and I have absolutely no idea what the song is about, nor do I really care. But Mullins only barely scores some points in this category. While the playing is good, it's just all sort of uninteresting.
Ultimately, 9th Ward Pickin' Parlor, while not without its perks, is a hollow album full of shallow songs, and anybody looking for a really great country album can definitely do better.
