Laura Stevenson "Laura Stevenson (Don Giovani)"
From Don Giovani Records:
“The journey that this new collection of songs takes the listener on may be a familiar one for anyone going through the stages of grief. “Mary” sees Stevenson alone at her piano, recalling the long drive to the scene of the crisis, an agnostic bargaining with holy figures to save a life. On mid-album highlight, “Sky Blue, Bad News” Stevenson punishes herself for things that were ultimately out of her control, going over events in her life that lead up to this moment to figure out why all of this was happening, “Did I shirk something? Did I hurt someone? Was I ever any good? Was I ungrateful?” All this uncertainty and darkness is juxtaposed against a Crazy-Horse-like canter (a song in particular which may remind listeners of Stevenson’s recent Neil Young covers EP with longtime friend and collaborator Jeff Rosenstock, who also plays guitar on some of the new self-titled album’s tracks).
Finally, Laura Stevenson ends on a moment of surreal tranquility: “Children’s National Transfer” is a window of sudden, crystalline calm amidst the chaos, as the narrator stops for a Diet Coke and a pack of cigarettes while waiting for an ambulance to arrive, “no one knows me in this store, pitiless me.”