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10 Song Demo

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It's oddly coincidental that Rosanne Cash's first No. 1 country hit was "Seven Year Ache." As it turns out, it's been seven long years since her previous album, 1996's 10 Song Demo, and though she'd written an album's worth of songs after that, her voice suddenly gave out due to a polyp on her vocal chords. Thanks to voice therapy, Cash was able to resume singing and recording, and the result is the hauntingly beautiful Rules of Travel. Tastefully produced by husband John Leventhal and featuring guest appearances by Sheryl Crow, Steve Earle, Teddy Thompson, and Johnny Cash, the album is a showcase for Cash's trenchant, soul-baring songs about love and mortality. Nearly every song is infused with a brooding melancholy, even the ones with sweet musical hooks ("Closer Than I Appear," "I'll Change For You"). When you hear the poignant "September When It Comes," a duet with her father and one of the album's highlights, you can't help but be stirred hearing them sing, "When the shadows lengthen and burn away the past/they will fly me like an angel to a place where I can rest." Rules of Travel is an impressive musical return from one of our most gifted singer-songwriters--and her voice, by the way, sounds as good as ever. --David Hill

Rating : - So beautiful, I had to buy it twice
Sometimes you buy a CD and through no fault of your own someone else falls in love with it so hard and they're struggling to make ends meet... when you leave, you just can't bear to take it from them.

That's how it happened with this CD. Spent a couple of days in Portland with my ex, his new wife and toddler son and we all sat and cried as the little boy looked on in wonder and tried to comfort the three of us. We were crying for the beauty and honestly of music soaring straight from the heart of a woman who knows what it means to love, to lose, to hurt and get back up and get on with life. Roseanne Cash is her own person and yet possesses the soul and power of the people who brought her into this world and love her. This woman is a gift, a legacy evolving: to compare artists and say 'one is more genuine than another' is a bit surreal, as genuine is unique to the individual: Roseanne Cash, Richard Thompson, Willie Nelson, Rosalie Sorrels, John Coltrane, Ned Sublette (and every one of the Persuasions), Arthur Lee (late, of Love), Elliott Smith, Happy Rhodes, Jon Langford, Mercedes Sosa... unique to themselves.

So I bought it again, a used CD (seemed appropriate and the price was reasonable) and hope Roseanne gets some percentage of these sales. I may have to buy this a third time before my I've drawn my final breath. Some albums are left behind accidentally on purpose because you know one day you'll buy the same album again. Kudos to Rosanne, genuinely herself, courageously speaking her heart and letting the rest of us who grew up listening to her Dad hear him with her during his final days. Sail on, brave hearts.