What separates a Mary Chapin Carpenter album from others of her style (folk/country) is the simple ability to haunt us with her words and musical arrangements. Certainly she has had some serious practice having been releasing albums since 1987. But it is without question that she just gets better and better as she releases each album. Her previous works with Rounder Records are some of the best of her career.
The Things That We Are Made Of is a strong collection of songs. Weaving through all eleven tracks, there is the usual natural tenderness that Mary Chapin Carpenter employs when musically presenting her songs to you. With an embracing display of supporting music that complements her acoustic guitar work, the shivering coolness that you experience is not that of the air; it’s the quality of an ethereal beauty that frames each song.
The opening track, “Something Tamed Something Wild” tells a story of remembrance of times in your life that were special to us, recognizable as we review them. We are defined to ourselves by the intense moments of our lives, and Mary Chapin Carpenter showcases a brilliant understanding of those memories with this song.
She closes a fantastic album with a ‘close to the heart’ title track, reminding us that we are more than what we seem. The music that frames this song is expansively haunting and echoing. In between the opening song and the closer, we are held close. This is not an easy feat with artists but Mary Chapin Carpenter seems to know the formula.
Using songs that remind us of our oft-visited past, Mary Chapin Carpenter gift to listeners is her ability to sit with us, to help us sift through our past with her entrancing voice, her ‘put us at ease’ guitar work. Along with the production’s use of other essential instruments that are relegated to the background to give Mary Chapin Carpenter the room that she needs to spin her magical spells, all eleven of them, she has engineered a must have album.
As far as I’m concerned, Mary Chapin Carpenter is as beautiful an artist as those others that we hold dear to us. The Things That We Are Made Of is another classic.
Even the cover is haunting.