Sam Baker,
Pretty World

Label: self-released
Released: 2007

(5 out of 5)

Devastatingly beautiful. That's the best way to describe Sam Baker's Pretty World. And the superlatives don't end there. "Odessa" just may be one of the finest songs I've ever heard, intricately interweaving the traditional "Hard Times Come Again No More" with the tale of an oil baron whose besotted self-indulgence takes the life of his young love. It's a loss he never can shake, despite growing riches from the ever-flowing West Texas crude. And it's a rich novella, told in under 6 minutes. As on his 2004 debut Mercy, Baker celebrates humanity in all of our sacred-and-profane intricacies. "Pretty World" and especially "Sweetly Undone" border on the artfully erotic:

Remember New Year's Eve? And no it's not a test
At the top of the stairs you slowly undressed…
Oh father oh son, slowly undress
Sweetly undone

Yet darkness lurks in the sadistic taskmaster of "Psychic" and particularly the haunting memories of "Broken Fingers":

How long ago? Sixteen years
Every day, of course I know…
Forget his face? Of course I don't
Etched like a crystal vase
These broken fingers, some things don't heal
I can't wake up from a dream when the dream is real…
There are blue eyes, a silhouette
There is a debt, a debt I don't forget

Baker was seriously injured in a train attacked by Peruvian guerrillas in 1986, and in the years following he worked on recovery both physical and spiritual. He refined his storytelling, learned to play guitar with his left hand, and, through vocals irreparably altered by the bombing, began to share his wonder at the beautiful complexity of life. His songs are meticulously crafted and almost Cormac McCarthy-ian in their restraint. There are no wasted syllables; there is no wall of sound. Instead, we simply hear a man with an acoustic guitar and a scraggly voice, backed by occasional guitars, strings, and drums. The music is absorbing, the lyrics moving. Forget concentrating on anything else while the album plays. Pretty World has dominated my listening for nearly two months now, each session embedding it a little deeper into my soul. Let it into yours, too.

Listen: "Juarez," "Odessa," "Sweetly Undone," "Broken Fingers"

Buy: Lone Star Music, iTunes

July 25, 2007