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Rating: * * * *
Of the various voices competing for attention among a crowded American left-field of country-folk singer-songwriters, Micah P. Hinson remains a standout. And not just because he has a colourful backstory of Christian upbringing, drugs, jail and bankruptcy.
While his bruised burr of a baritone remains his music's backbone, here on this his third album, it sounds like there's a substantial light cutting through the noir-ish gloom.
That's especially true on the initially hymnal Tell Me It Ain't So when his burred voice leaps an octave-lead as the strings of the "Red Empire Orchestra" swell behind him; or when that happens again even more dramatically on You Will Find Me; or when on Sunrise Over the Olympus Mons the initially slow-motion country moper of a song swells thrillingly into something of grand Sigur Ros dimensions.
There are numbers of less dramatic design delivering just as heavy an emotional punch with just Hinson's voice and a few strummed notes - whether it's the bittersweet You Ain't Calling the Shots , or banjo-powered The Wishing Well. It stretches itself a little long as an album but for the most part it proves Hinson is the dark wonder of the nu-twang gang.
Russell Baillie
