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CD review: Court Yard Hounds ‘Court Yard Hounds’
Court Yard Hounds
‘Court Yard Hounds’
(Columbia)
Grade B
In the beginning, there were four Dixie Chicks — sisters Emily Robison and Martie Maguire teamed with Robin Lynn Macy and Laura Lynch. Then just with Lynch, then with Natalie Maines, she of the thermonuclear voice. The latter group has sold tens of millions of records and scored 15 Grammys and turned into a cultural referendum when Maines told a London audience that she wasn’t too wild about war in Iraq in 2003.
Now, with Maines in Los Angeles in the middle of a musical hiatus dating to 2007, we’re back to the core of Robison and Maguire billed as the Court Yard Hounds, writing and performing low-key, country/folk-grass about love and its complicated, adult consequences. It’s hard to see this as more than a side project (a reunited Dixie Chicks plays some shows with the Eagles this summer). But everyone has been silent about new Chicks albums, and this is also more than a toss-off. It’s also hard to not notice Robison’s divorce from musician Charlie Robison in songs such as “Skyline,” “April’s Love” and even the backsliding “I Miss You.”
“Gracefully,” the still-married Maguire’s breakup tune, is the most brutal and direct: (“We settle like oil and water/ I, I just wanna smile again/but you just wanna drown in the bottle”). The zippy single “The Coast” reminds everyone that Fleetwood Mac is a big part of these gals’ musical DNA, and the rocking “Ain’t No Son” looks at the horror of a son coming out to a father who hates him. There’s nothing here that would be out of place on a Chicks album, nor is there anything here that would necessarily be improved by Maines’ belt. Like the most complex romantic breakups, it is impossible to tell if this is a good or bad thing.
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