The Black Dirt Sessions

The Black Dirt Sessions is this band's "After the Goldrush," stuffed with devastating songs laid bare by weathered, redemption-seeking renegades.

While sticking to his A-game has served him well so far, it's worth noting that the songs themselves just aren't quite as resonant this time out, resulting in an album that's merely very good instead of incredible.

The paino ballads make Black Dirt more melancholy than previous efforts, but no less masterful. [Jun 2010, p.102]

These are bright, durable songs, and Mr. McCauley liberates them from any telltale hints of artifice, whether he's caressing them alone or roughing them up with his band mates, who manage a credible honky-tonk snarl.

Songs written to sound like old pub standards helped to gain the group attention, but these heartfelt tunes gleam with McCauley's individuality.

The Black Dirt Sessions is roughly the equivalent of The Replacements going straight from the rowdy delinquency of 1981's "Sorry Ma, Forget To take Out The Trash" to the ashen resignation of 1990's "All Shook Down," with nothing in between. [Aug 2010, p.74]

John McCauley's transformation from singer of a rock band to something a good bit deeper, is on display within the running order of The Black Dirt Sessions, the band's third and finest album to date.

It's not the album that will define Deer Tick as a force in their own right, or McCauley as a songwriter on a par with his heroes, but The Black Dirt Sessions is the best set yet from this still-rising quintet.

The Black Dirt Sessions delivers even more grit and lyrical heaviness than its predecessors, revealing a desperate, wayworn side to McCauley's songwriting.

While not punch-for-punch or track-for-track the heavy-hitter "War Elephant" was, or even offering the tonal variety of "Born on Flag Day," the consistency has come into its own doleful focus, the lyrics have reached a blisteringly high point and for any/all flaws, and, in the end, it just leaves me holding the broken pieces of my face in my fucking hands.

Black Dirt delivers sulky dirges ("Blood Moon"), alt-country hangovers ("Mange"), and funeral ballads ("Goodbye, Dear Friend") with equal aplomb, as their leader's bedraggled voice groans with hard-earned heaviness.