Country for Grown Ups

On  The Bird & The Rifle (out July 29 on CN Records/Thirty Tigers), Lori McKenna continues to occupy a niche once shared by a lot more country music. Before it bro’d down, country prided itself on writing about real relationships between real adults, with a hardscrabble maturity lacking in pop.  This remains the emotional core of McKenna’s songcraft, and it has made her a go-to songwriter for the likes of Faith Hill, Tim McGraw (who topped the charts with her “Humble & Kind,” included here) and Little Big Town. You don’t look to McKenna for her range—vocal, musical or lyrical. The songs here are almost invariably about two people—the singer is one, and a man with whom she’s involved is the other. The power is in the precision; the devastation is in the details.  The opening “Wreck You” evokes the puzzled despair of a woman who knows something has gone very wrong but can’t understand why: “I don’t know if it’s you or me, but lately all I do seems to wreck you.” The closing “If Whiskey Were a Woman” also pulls no punches, as the singer acknowledges (to herself most of all) that she isn’t what he really loves. She gives even the familiar scenario of “Old Men Young Women” a freshness and edge, with “Halfway Home” delivering a similar message to a young woman selling herself short.  The Boston native with the Nashville twang continues to evoke Springsteen with her reflections in a rear-view mirror, “Giving Up on Our Hometown” and “We Were Cool.” Producer Dave Cobb underscores the strength of the material with spare arrangements that let her conversational vocals slip under the song’s skin.