RSSMary Lou Lord [extended]
- Got No Shadow [Work, 1998] A-
- Mary Lou Lord/Sean Na Na [Kill Rock Stars EP, 2000] B+
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Consumer Guide Reviews:
Got No Shadow [Work, 1998]
Only indie perverts would hyperventilate over Lord's breathy voice, which needs every booster jet mind can devise or money can buy. And only indie perverts would object to her long-aborning major-label debut, where she gets the help she needs. The production is Amy Rigby-style neotraditionalism, with Roger McGuinn rippling under one flowing surge just to mark the concept, and, overcoming her fondness for Nick Saloman (Bevis Frond, don't you know anything?), she makes the most of covers from Elizabeth Cotten to Freedy Johnston. Equally impressive, every once in a while she finds the gumption to eke out a song so winsomely conceived and solidly constructed it belongs in the canon she adores. Sometimes Saloman even helps--the cowritten lead track is a hummer worthy of Stuart Musgrove (Belle and Sebastian, don't you know anything at all?). A-
Mary Lou Lord/Sean Na Na: Mary Lou Lord/Sean Na Na [Kill Rock Stars EP, 2000]
Two born buskers split a six-song EP that contains, the very idea, at least four identifiable songs. Pioneering Courtney-basher Lord covers Lucinda Williams and follows Kelly Willis and Two Nice Girls to a Janis Martin rockabilly number. Sean Tillmann deserts the one-man punk band Calvin Krime to wax sardonic about his funeral and his misspent youth, both of which I hope he lives to enjoy. B+