Hope Dunbar: June 2021 Artist of the Month

 

Hope Dunbar

Sweetheartland

 

Hope Dunbar made an earlier appearance in this column for her Three Black Crows project. I liked it a lot. I love her latest, Sweetheartland. I love it so much that I’ll just come out and say if Hope Dunbar isn’t the next big thing in country music, every record producer in America should undergo a brain transplant!

 

The title track is both memorable and deceptive. It’s a paean to the American midlands, the people who work it, and—as the title implies–her sweetheart. Ahh, let’s talk about that. She’s the wife of a small-town Nebraska minister, but she’s not cut from the robes you might imagine. Once we get our catchy opening appetizer, Dunbar mixes affability and nostalgia with attitude, defiance, and the occasional boot in the butt. She’s a bit what you’d get if you blended Lori McKenna, Emmylou Harris, and Dolly Parton.

 

You want attitude? Try “What Were You Thinking?” It’s about a jilted woman, but not one who’s about to lick her wounds: I was up making a list of all the things I had lost and it turns out that losing you only slightly decreases what I’ve got. Not angry enough for you? There’s this: … all I need is a lighter, your clothes and a gasoline can. Dunbar enhances the pugnacious mood by soaring with and above her fine backing band. “Dog Like You” gives a swampy blues treatment to another better-off-without-him song. One can easily imagine Dolly singing this one, an impish smile upon her face.

 

Sometimes it pays to have a little mileage behind you. Her song “More” is one example of that, with its mix of dreams and being grateful for what she has: And what more could I possibly want? I’ve got blessings in spades/I’ve got full sun in winter and in the summer I got shade/But I look out the window and I envy the bird/And’s I’m thinking more, more more/Ain’t a four-letter word. When we hear Dunbar sing “Woman Like Me,” it’s simply impossible to imagine an innocent young Nashville newbie credibly covering it. McKenna comparisons spring immediately to mind, especially with its edgy ambiguity. Is Dunbar accepting her lot, lamenting it, or just telling it like it is. One thing is clear: It might be a good idea for Dunbar to be on the road more, as I can’t imagine the roof of her husband’s church could sustain the force of her voice. Speaking of force, Dunbar lives in tornado alley. “Evacuate” is a clarion call not to mess with warnings, and she doesn’t. She sings it with dead earnest, as she should.

 

It’s hard not to love “John Prine,” Dunbar’s tribute to the late, great Illinois-bred troubadour who perished from Covid. She absolutely nails Prine’s sensibilities, especially his uncanny ability to pick up mundane things and hurl them back at us wrapped in meaning and tied up with a silly ribbon. Plus, if you’ve ever wielded a pen and tried to write a tune of your own, you can surely appreciate Dunbar’s line: John Prine, John Prine, I wish your songs were mine/Wish I could steal one of your lines and no one would know.

With that thought, I’ll end this review by saying that it’s time for the music industry to pay attention to a Nebraska preacher’s wife who writes and sings like few can. Can country music handle a mature woman who gives us both roses and thorns?

 

Rob Weir