Audio CD review:
Mary Chapin Carpenter - Time Sex Love (Multichannel/Stereo)

Mary Chapin Carpenter - Time Sex Love (Multichannel/Stereo)

Band: Mary Chapin Carpenter Title: Time Sex Love (Multichannel/Stereo) Rating: Release Date: 15 January, 2002 Media: Audio CD Tracks: 1: Whenever You're Ready 2: Simple Life 3: Swept Away 4: Slave to the Beauty 5: Maybe World 6: What Was It Like 7: King of Love 8: This Is Me Leaving You 9: Someone Else's Prayer 10: Dreaming Road 11: Alone But Not Lonely 12: Long Way Home 13: In the Name of Love 14: Late for Your Life

Editoral Review Since those late-'80s/early-'90s high points, the Brown University graduate has often pushed niceties such as catchiness to the artistic back burner. On albums like State of the Heart, Shooting Straight in the Dark, and Come on Come On, Mary Chapin Carpenter melded folkie singer-songwriter concerns with melodies and hooks that country (and, occasionally, adult-pop) radio programmers could get behind foursquare. Despite some too-languid stretches, Time* Sex* Love*, her first studio disc since 1996, finds Carpenter recapturing some of the balance that marked the best of those earlier records. "In the Name of Love" lifts off with a trademark midtempo groove and a complex lyric about attraction and independence. Other tracks subtly spice Carpenter's formula with lovely, sighing vocal harmonies and fleeting evocations of Beatles-era AM radio. Her need to attempt major statements about the sad realities of grownup life may ultimately be Time's biggest flaw; where's Carpenter hiding her gifts for limning small moments (State's "This Shirt") or events that few other songwriters would think to commit to tape (Shooting's comet-appearance commemoration "Halley Came to Jackson")? There's reality, and there's reality. --Rickey Wright .. You can see a complete list of all Mary Chapin Carpenter discography, or go back to the Mary Chapin Carpenter tabs