REVIEW: Lorrie Morgan — Dead Girl Walking” (LP)
Let’s face it — Lorrie Morgan doesn’t need to record another album. The country music legend has nothing to prove. Her legacy is secure. These indisputable truths make her new release Dead Girl Walking more remarkable. She tackles the ten tracks as if she still feels the same creative fire in her belly that propelled her into the country music stratosphere. Her instincts for well-suited material have never sounded sharper. She essays tunes from such country music luminaries as Larry Gatlin and Mickey Newbury, and pop standards. She gives lesser-known but prodigiously gifted songwriters such as Marty Morgan and Kelly Lang their time in the sun. Morgan doesn’t sound like a singer basking in the twilight of her career.
She sounds like she’s just getting started.
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“Hands on You” serves notice that your expectations will never hem her in. The Ashley Monroe/Jon Randall-penned opener portrays untampered desire, and Morgan delivers a suggestive yet stylish performance certain to capture the listener’s attention. It has stronger pop inclinations than country, but she sounds utterly at home in this environment. The title song places Morgan in more familiar musical territory. The Kelly Lang authored “Dead Girl Walking” is a classic song about picking up the pieces after heartbreak never weakened by cliché. Morgan’s deeply felt phrasing invests the strong lyrics with the right measure of drama. Effective use of guitar distinguishes the musical attack and imbues the arrangement with unexpected forcefulness.
Morgan contributes to the writing of “Mirror, Mirror” alongside co-writers such as Lang and Mark Oliverius. The stark, near-hushed delicacy of the performance spotlights Morgan’s talent for getting under the skin of a song and inhabiting its dramatic potential with an elegant ghostly spirit. Listeners expecting this cut to balloon into momentous classic Nashville theatrics will be disappointed. Instead, Morgan tempers the song’s approach with great effect. “Days Like These” has a much lighter tone in comparison. It’s a song beaming with gratitude for life’s simpler pleasures. However, it never sounds saccharine in Morgan’s treatment, and grounding its sentiments with a down-to-earth arrangement and straightforward approach pays enormous dividends for the performer and her audience.
Her cover of Mickey Newbury’s “What Will I Do?” is one of Dead Girl Walking’s peaks. The presence of keyboards underpinning the arrangement is an exquisite touch that bolsters the song. However, Morgan’s singing excels and demonstrates the continuing vitality of her technical and emotional range. She sinks her teeth into Newbury’s outstanding lyrics and makes every syllable meaningful for listeners. Her performance of Larry Gatlin’s “I Almost Called Him Baby by Mistake” deserves consideration as a high water mark in Morgan’s career. It’s a bulldozer of a song with its classic country virtues shining bright, and she makes the most of every moment. Morgan realizes the near-flawless construction of the track and its convincing sentiments to the fullest, and the note-perfect accompaniment is the song’s crowning touch.
Concluding with a cover of Sam Cooke’s classic “You Send Me” is a neat touch. She’s never been afraid to move outside the country music genre if the material suits her intentions and talents. This is an excellent choice. She fills “You Send Me” with warm affection that closes Dead Girl Walking on an uplifting note. It’s a fantastic release from beginning to end that reasserts Morgan’s presence as a vital force in the music community.
Colin Jordan
