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Red Dirt Girl Artist: Emmylou Harris Label: Nonesuch Records Length: 12 tracks - 55:24 mins.

For all of the 25 years of her career, Emmylou Harris has been known as an interpreter of songs.   She's given us wonderful versions of Gram Parson's "Wheels," Townes Van Zandt's "Pancho & Lefty," Nanci Griffith's "Gulf Coast Highway," and countless other songs that she has made her own through the emotive powers of that sweet and beautiful voice.  Occasionally, we've been given a glimpse into her inner world through some of her songwriting--songs like "Boulder to Birmingham" and "Prayer In Open D."  But her many recording projects have been predominantly filled with the songs of others.  That is, until this her latest release "Red Dirt Girl." 

Eleven of the twelve songs on this cd were written by Harris and if we've waited 25 years for this, it's been well worth the wait. Drawing from many things that, she says, she "knew she was going to have to write about," she touches on lost loves, marriage, the mother/daughter relationships, love for her father, even the meaning of life.  And through it all, she does it with poetry that is almost breathtaking in its beauty.  In "Michelangelo" she sings:

Last night I dreamed about you
I dreamed that you were weeping
And your tears poured down like diamonds
For a love beyond all keeping
And you caught them one by one
In a million silk bandanas that I gave you long ago
Michelangelo

Nobody knows when she started her skid
She was only 27 and she had 5 kids
Coulda' been the whiskey, coulda' been the pills
Coulda' been the dreams she was tryin' to kill
But there won't be a mention in the news of the world
About the life and the death of a red dirt girl
Named Lillian
Who never got any farther across the line than Meridian

So there'll be no guiding light for you and me
We are not sailors lost out on the sea
We were always searching for eternity
Hoping for a glimpse of Galilee

This is music that becomes more dear with each listen, making its way into ones' soul and taking up residence.  Emmylou Harris says that she won't give up her "day job"--that of interpreting others' music, but if she's got more songs like these inside of her, we will all be better for her sharing them with us.  For now, this disk is a "must have."

Janet Friesen 9/30/2000

Emmylou Harris blew the music world away in 1994 when she teamed up with Daniel Lanois to record an album that was far removed from her country catalogue and set her up there with the greats of the century. It was a slow burn mood piece with the same soundscapes and atmospherics that made Bob Dylan’s Oh Mercy such an elegant experience.

Since then Emmylou has seemed to be omnipresent as a backing vocalist for the likes of Ryan Adams, Vigilantes Of Love, Julie Miller, Lucinda Williams and Steve Earle to name a few. She has also released a live album, Trio 2 with Dolly and Linda Ronstadt and The Tuscan Sessions with Ronstadt again as well as being the driving force behind the magnificent Gram Parsons tribute Grievous Angel.  And everything was blessed and received with thankfulness but I couldn’t help wonder if it was all a delaying tactic. How could she follow Wrecking Ball?

Well the answer is here. It was always asking a lot and Emmylou has not played it all safe in the effort. Following an album where you choose some of the best writers ever like Dylan, Young, Earle and the McGarrigles and then pick the very best of those very best, by writing almost entirely all the tracks yourself is just making it all even harder. Harris was never renowned as a writer. In interviews Harris is saying that she was consciously trying to make it different by trying to write the most of it herself but ended up with so many songs that only Patti Griffin’s "One Big Love" got covered.

So how do you follow Wrecking Ball when you decide to write the album yourself. Very well indeed. Remarkably actually. Emmylou’s writing here is a very literary one and there are many great lines and every song stands up well to comparisons with Wrecking Ball.  There is no higher compliment than that. Like a Red Dirt train it is a scenically Sunday afternoon pace that chugs and slows and slides along with drum box programming and constantly interesting backdrops from musicians of the expected high calibre-­Buddy and Julie Miller, Ruben Blades and Daryl Johnson to name but four. The opening "The Pearl" meanders in a complex way that sets out the stall of Lanois country with the French Canadians partner Malcolm Burn keeping it atmospheric, eerie and deep seated gorgeous. "Tragedy" sees the haunting backing vocals of Bruce Springsteen doing to a song what Harris usually does to others. "Bang The Drum" is for me the highlight as Harris conjures up that weird emotion of death where mourning and beautiful transcendent strength mingle in the bitter sweet tears of aching sadness and comforting hope.

Belief is a constant recurring theme. Biblical ideas of devils and angels and shepherds and Armageddon and eternity follow the most intriguing lines of purpose and thesis from "The Pearl," “We were always headed for eternity/Hoping to glimpse of Galilee.” This is a  fine collection of songs for the pilgrims hymnal to sing on the journey.

Like growing up, and even admitting to, in growing old and realizing that you made many mistakes or at least second rate decisions in getting to the place where you are comfortable and confident with yourself you wonder whether Emmylou has many albums she now regrets when she listens to the undoubted genius and maturity of Red Dirt Girl. 

Steve Stockman 10/5/2000