Review: Morgan Wade Expertly Articulates Complex Feelings on ‘Obsessed’

RATING CHART:

1 note – Pass

1.5 notes – Mediocre

2 notes – Average

2.5 notes – Above Average

3 notes – Good

3.5 notes – Great

4 notes – Excellent

4.5 notes – Exceptional

5 notes – Classic

Videos by American Songwriter

MORGAN WADE

OBSESSED

(Ladylike Records/RCA Nashville)

🎵🎵🎵

By now, it’s clear that even though the heavily tattooed Morgan Wade might look like she fronts a death metal band, the truth is far different. The Nashville-by-way-of-Virginia singer/songwriter/Americana artist has created a remarkably successful career in just four years. Wade’s dedication to songcraft, her honest, raspy, Southern-tinged voice, and tunes reflecting her innermost fears and foibles resonate with fans of darker, indie roots music.

Wade’s rapid popularity generated a demanding work ethic, resulting in two studio albums in three years between constant touring and a well-publicized medical issue. Her third album finds her in melancholy territory.

Push play, and the first words you hear are, I’m tired out here on the road. Over the next 14 songs and 55 minutes, that feeling reverberates with the complexities of someone who realizes the need to slow down and take stock of their life, specifically in the area of romantic affiliations.

She is thoroughly obsessed, as the disc’s title implies, with love in its conflicted facets. That includes unrequited love (the gripping “Walked on the Water,” featuring Kesha on harmony vocals and “Time to Love, Time to Kill”) as well as promising futures. The title track makes this clear when she sings, My entire life is wrapped up in your hazel eyes, with poignant, heartwarming honesty.

Producer and touring guitarist Clint Wells captures these sentiments in uncluttered, ringing, strumming songs like the opening “Total Control” and the widescreen, easy throb of “Crossing State Lines.” The latter, at almost seven minutes, is the longest and most complex selection.

Ballads, some with strings, dominate, as acoustic guitars and crying pedal steel provide a bed for flowing melodies where Wade overlays lovelorn lyrics. While these are unfailingly affecting, editing a few would help prevent the flow from getting stuck in the slow lane.

As with other albums that surgically dissect relationships, many of these songs can be applied to anyone experiencing similar feelings, so expertly and often tragically articulated on the intimate Obsessed.

Photo by Matthew Berinato