Dixie Dirt - Pieces of the World

Genre rock Publisher self-released External Links Official Website

Right from the beginning of the album you know that the music is going to be deliberate: the repetitive drumlines, bass lines, and guitar riffs make for a smooth-enough backdrop for Kat Brock's intentionally broken voice. At times it seems like she's almost going for a little bit of Joanna Newsom, though the lyrics and music here are not nearly that whimsical. The first few tracks are very droney, with some reversed quitar and long, brooding introductions building to slow peaks. Things really pick up during the almost-too-long fourth track, "Driving." At first it seems like a departure from the stuff that has come before, but before long we hear the texture we've grown accustomed to as the song climaxes nice and slowly. The album peaks, I think, at "Sleep Part I" and "Sleep Part 2." The first part is a tortured, relentless instrumental, followed by a big buiild (if you haven't guessed by now, it's what Dixie Dirt does well) into a more optimistic section with vocals. The album has an effective outro, pumping things up with the catchy (for this band) "Dance Song," followed by the denoument of "15th Street" and "Appetite," both slow like the songs at the beginning of the album, but both decidedly happier.