Jenny Lewis – Joy'All
On her fifth record, Jenny Lewis decamps to Nashville and makes a stately record worthy of the city's heritage
Jenny Lewis, a former child actor so synonymous with Los Angeles, is perhaps a surprise transplant to Nashville, where she made Joy’All, but the sonic impact of the move is not to imbue her songwriting with more of a country feel. Instead, it shines through in the sense of inner peace it appears to have instilled in Lewis, whose lyrical scalpel has never been sharper than on this quietly knowing set of songs reflecting on ageing and contentment.
Much of Joy’All came out of a week-long virtual songwriting workshop hosted by Beck, and while the songs feel of a piece with one another, there is subtly rich variety here, from the retro pop of Love Feel and Chain of Tears to stargazing reflection on Essence of Life and the dusky groove of Giddy Up and the title track. On lead single Puppy and a Truck, she saves us the job of setting the contextual scene for the record by doing so herself. 'I was infatuated with an older man,' she sings of one relationship, 'and then I dated a psychopath'. That track is the record in microcosm, a paean to leaving emotional tumult behind in favour of a simpler life.
Listen to: Psychos, Puppy and a Truck, Apples and Oranges