Kacey Musgraves (“Justified”), the Grammy-award- winning singer-songwriter stuns yet again with her fifth studio album “star-crossed.” Released Sept. 10 through MCA Nashville and Interscope Records, the 15 track album has been met with mostly positive critic reviews and received a 77 on Metacritic, a website dedicated to the rating of albums, movies and TV shows.
A pop album, “star-crossed” crosses over genre lines to create a powerful blend of country, folk, soft rock and R&B. This blend is exactly what propels the album forward, creating a compelling and easy listening experience. It differs from the traditional Musgraves sound, one that tends to lean a bit closer to country, making for a fresh and new sound.
The titular first track, “star-crossed” serves as the perfect prologue for the rest of the album, setting the scene for a tragedy. Lyrics like “Two lovers ripped right at the seams” and “Did we fly too high just to get burned by the sun?” provide literary allusions to Shakespeare and Diodorus for “Romeo and Juliet” and the story of Icarus and Daedalus. These allusions, while subtle, show a mastery of songwriting in addition to providing the idea that the album follows a traditional three act play.
The three acts in question detail the feelings of someone caught in a relationship, attempting to make it work, realizing it will not and then accepting life after. This album has been dubbed Musgraves’ “divorce album” containing references to her divorce from Ruston Kelly, an American singer-songwriter with whom she was married for two years.
While the concept of a three act play might be hidden in the album, Musgraves hides little else, speaking in plain and rather simple terms. The second track “good wife,” begins with Musgraves muffled voice pleading: “Let’s go back to the beginning/I just wanna be a good wife.” This is not a veiled attempt to convey the pain of not feeling adequate in a relationship, this is a raw and blatant wish. The fact that Musgraves spells this out so clearly is an integral part of the album and adds to the overall understanding that “star-crossed” is both deeply emotional and unreserved.
The tables begin to turn with “breadwinner” as Musgraves details: “You’re gonna give it all and give it all/But you won’t get it back/I’m tellin’ you, it’s gonna hurt.” Moving away from the wishes of improving a relationship to understanding that despite your best efforts it will not work. Musgraves has a way of conveying this idea without much sense of revenge or anger, something that audiences may not be accustomed to when thinking of traditional break-up ballads. This is yet another example of her knack for pinpointing and articulating emotion. The “second act” is marked by this grief of reflecting on a relationship that dissolved. Songs “camera roll,” “easier said” and “hookup scene” illustrate the most gut wrenching feelings of the entire album. Which is juxtaposed incredibly with the song “keep lookin’ up” and the album’s remaining three songs.
Wrapping up with a cover of “gracias a la vida,” Musgraves perfectly encapsulates the idea that life, however painful, is still a beautiful thing. The pointed lyrics and dreamlike instrumentals mix fantasy and reality to create an album worth listening to. Musgraves has proven her ability to encapsulate emotion in a carefully curated and deeply moving way.
Image from Kacey Musgraves via YouTube
