Review #480: The Weight of These Wings, Miranda Lambert
#480: The Weight of These Wings, Miranda Lambert
At the risk of pissing country music fans off, I have a confession: I definitely thought Miranda Lambert was Carrie Underwood. Can you blame me? Two beautiful country blondes? They both debuted in 2005? Then released their second and third albums in 2007 and 2009? After realizing my mistake, I remember that I did really enjoy Lambert’s “The House That Built Me.” (But “Before He Cheats” rocks too.)
Lambert did NOT get her start on American Idol, but at the Johnnie High Country Music Revue. She quickly blew up — her debut album Kerosene went platinum. She would go on to launch the girl country supergroup the Pistol Annies, and later — in what I would consider to be a career peak — starred in an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
Lambert married Blake Shelton in 2011, who is allegedly another country music star, though I know none of his songs and refuse to look any up. In 2015, the two divorced. Shelton went on to famously date and marry No Doubt’s Gwen Stefani (who herself had recently divorced Bush frontman Gavin Rossdale), and honestly he was kind of a punk about it. He told Gayle King, “You think you know what love is, and for me, I didn’t until [Gwen] came into my life.” Aw, whatever. People in love are so annoying.
This is all to say that this is Miranda Lambert’s divorce album, released a year after her separation. It’s also a double album with approximately ten billion credited backup singers. She had a lot to say! But like so many other moody country music albums, now I can’t stop listening to it.
You’d expect some bitter love songs from a divorce album, and you’d get some. She sings with deep regret about the fact that she has a heart at all. “Use My Heart” shoots straight: The thought of loving you just makes me sick. “Six Degrees of Separation” is about how she can’t escape thoughts of her former husband, no matter how far she goes. See also “Tin Man,” “Things That Break,” and “Well-Rested.” She also lets herself wallow in despair at the bottom of the bottle — sometimes she convinces herself it’s all in good fun (“Ugly Lights”) and other times you feel the hurt (“Vice”).
Then there are the more hopeful songs — “Smoking Jacket” and “Pushin’ Time” have her wishing for another desperate love. So does “Bad Boy,” albeit a more suspicious one. And I loved “To Learn Her,” which is a Patsy Cline-style love song. But I think Lambert’s best love songs are her love songs for the road. “Runnin’ Just In Case” is like a quiet, slowed-down “Graceland,” while “Highway Vagabond” is virtually a Merle song. See also “Covered Wagon” and the self-belief anthem “I’ve Got Wheels.”
I would bet that self-belief goes a long way in the wake of a divorce, and Miranda Lambert seems to have found it: both in a pair of “Pink Sunglasses” and in the joy of being a “Tomboy.” Best of all, she found it in nature. “Good Ol’ Days” and “Dear Old Sun” are love letters to the great outdoors and how little human beings are, while “For the Birds” is a celebration of the little things, with birds the littlest of all. I’m for tweedle-deedle-dee-dee-dee. How delightful.
Lambert also celebrates other forms of human connection. See “You Wouldn’t Know Me” and “We Should Be Friends.” I especially loved “Keeper of the Flame,” a self-conscious anthem about carrying the torch handed to her by other women country greats. Also, everything I read online said that “Getaway Driver” is written from a man’s perspective, but I see no reason that it can’t be a love song between two women, or even a song about a deep female friendship.
Lambert went through the ringer, but don’t worry, she got a happy ending, marrying an NYPD officer in 2019. I guess being on SVU panned out for her!
Fun Fact: Her parents were private detectives who happened to work on Bill Clinton’s impeachment case.
Review #479: Amor Prohibido, Selena
Review #481: If You’re Feeling Sinister, Belle and Sebastian
