Her third album Strays, aptly, strays a long way from her early retro-country sound. Price can’t be confined to any one genre. There are echoes of Tom Petty here and a strong dollop of psychedelia on the surging opener Been To The Mountain, a hypnotic confessional that builds to a paranoid, semi-spoken rant.
Change Of Heart is powered by a simple, addictive bluesy guitar riff, while the haunting piano-led County Road could be Stevie Nicks singing a lost Springsteen gem. Surprises abound. Mike Campbell (formerly of Petty’s Heartbreakers) guests on Light Me Up which segues from delicate folk to vintage Zeppelin-style rock.
Sharon Van Etten joins the party on the seductively foot-tapping Radio, and indie-pop duo Lucius light up the lush ballad Anytime You Call with harmonies.
Lyrically, Margo, 39, has even more to say. Her heartbreaking ballad Lydia paints a mournful portrait of a woman who sells herself for synthetic heroin, “tied like a dog on a chain with a mid-wife crisis and an ex-husband”. She’s pregnant in a methadone clinic knowing she can’t afford to raise a child. “I could build a landfill of dreams I deserted,” she sings.
Price paints vivid pictures of life at the bottom and her own life has dipped into troughs of misery worthy of a Happy Valley character. The Illinois-born star has survived the loss of her son, infidelity, alcohol addiction and substance abuse.
Strays, written with husband Jeremy Ivey, is her most ambitious yet, confirming her promise while underlining her need to keep moving.
Her gut instinct is to take chances. And you know what? The Price is right.
