Simultaneously gruff and intimate,
Caroline Herring's second album,
Wellspring, offers 11 tracks of Southwestern acoustic folk-based country with appropriate focus on her obvious songwriting talent and her equally powerful voice. Like her soulful country contemporaries (
Kim Richey,
Shelby Lynne,
Patty Griffin),
Herring's breathy sensuality punctuates her themes of love, loss, and heartache, and her understated vocals, while never over-reaching, often swell and break under the strain of the song's own emotion. The leadoff track, "Trace," sets the pace for the entire record, and
Kelly Willis unobtrusively lends her vocal talents to the album's highlight, "Jewels." The inclusion of the parlor blues number "Texas Two Step" is a little incongruous amid the rest of the straight-ahead folk songs, but ultimately proves the versatility that
Herring is capable of. ~ Zac Johnson