FOLKWAX

Romi Mayes: Achin In Yer Bones

Turn Off the Radio, Come Lie With Me, (04/22/09)

Romi Mayes is one of the hardest working Canadian artists, and her hard work is about to pay off. Achin In Yer Bones is her second collaboration with producer Gurf Morlix, who's been responsible for such gems like Ray Wylie Hubbard's Snake Farm, Mary Gauthier's Mercy Now, Slaid Cleaves' Wishbones, the first few Lucinda Williams albums, and a couple of brilliant but greatly underrated Gurf Morlix albums, like Diamonds To Dust.
Mayes is a great entertainer who offers her audiences a range of Blues to Folk and rockers to ballads. Her writing gets better and better, and Achin In Yer Bones includes a couple of outstanding tunes. I especially love her duet with Morlix in "Mercy On Me:" "Headlights shining down a dead end street, but you're in too deep..." and the title song is brilliant, too. Creepy guitar licks and still full of warmth. "I spent 40 hours coming down that Greyhound bus alone, 40 hours longing for a home, it's 40 hours aching in your bones..." Some of the other songs are just entertaining, but still force you to listen, if only - as in "Hard Road" - because of her sexy, magnetic voice: "turn off the radio, come lie with me..."

Evert Wilbrink is a contributing writer at FolkWax. You may contact Evert at folkwax@visnat.com.