Reviews
Artist:Ward Davis Album: Black Cats And Crows
Label: Thirty Tigers
Tracks: 14
Website: http://www.warddavis.com
Raised in Arkansas and based in Nashville, his songs recorded by the likes of Trace Adkins, Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard, this is Davis's second album, a collection of new solid country rock numbers that frequently call Waylon Jnnings to mind along with a revisiting of a track from his 2018 EP, Asunder.
'Ain't Gonna Be Today' opens proceedings with an echo of vintage Eagles, especially in the guitar sound, a song in the not getting over you yet tradition, and then hits the piano based title track, a co-write with Cody Jinks and TN Jet that taps into a dark period in his life for a lyric drenched in despondency ("Every day's just another day to die/I wake up wondering why I even try") in which he reckon's God's got in for him, though the guitar solo should be enough to warrant divine forgiveness.
He remains with the piano, adding some steel, for 'Threads', another downbeat number ("digging deeper down into a dried up well /And beat and worn and torn to shreds") written in between divorce/new relationship limbo. The line "Another day the same old hell" resurfaces in the subsequent murder/prison ballad 'Sounds of Chains', the narrator (who killed both his cheating woman and her lover) finding God while waiting on death row as they burn in hell, though the final verse throws a wry twist that suggests being born again isn't a get out of jail free card. Testament to Davis's outlaw country credentials, it features a guest electric guitar appearance by Scott Ian from metal outfit Anthrax.
The first of two alcohol soaked numbers comes with 'Get to Work Whiskey', a definite Waylon-like (or Chris Stapleton) number about turning to his old mate Jack to get over being dumped that comes with the clever word play line "give me your best shot".
Featuring fiddle, another Jinks co-write, the standout 'Colorado' is a gentler, more reflective post break up nostalgia cut ("I look back to when we carved our names in marble/On that Aspen by the cabin where we stayed/And I wonder if that tree still strong and standing/Despite the broken promises we made"). Another highlight comes with 'Book of Matches', another drink you off my mind number during a long night of the soul as memories of his ex literally go up in smoke.
Keeping things melancholic but veined with optimism, written some 15 years back about his now ex-wife, 'Heaven Had A Hand' is a slow walk country sway which, backed by piano and resonator guitar talks of some divine plan ("God must've looked down on me/And saw that I needed you /And put you right in my way") when you're engulfed in uncertainty.
'Where I Learned To Live' is another simple acoustic and pedal steel number that looks back on the formative years where your grew up that shape your life ("We used to cruise these streets in daddy's truck on Friday nights/And in that feed store parking lot is where I got in my first fight/And it's where we said I'm sorry, to this day he's still my friend /This ain't just a town, it's where I learned to live").
Things take a musical shift to get funkier and bluesier with a cover of Ray Scott's song 'Papa and Mama' about a teenage boy taking revenge on his father for the abuse his mother suffered,a second cover following with fiddle and piano for Alabama's broken spirit storysong 'Lady Down On Love'.
It winds down with three final tracks, the first being Shawn Camp co-write 'Nobody, a self-reflective post-divorce waltz through appearances and reality as he sings "Nobody knows what a Nobody I am/The mirror don't' lie and I see a wreck of a man.. Nobody knows how it feels when the leaving hits home/You stand in the door of your house and everything's gone /And you realize you go nothing left".
The last of the new material is 'Good to Say Goodbye', a song that perfectly captures the knowing you need to move on ("Seventeen, big and bad/Butting heads with my dad/It was time for me to leave that house"), how freedom can go to our head and drag you down ("Drinking nights, wasting days/I was in a real bad place") before finding salvation ("What she saw in me Heaven only knows/She helped me leave my demons all behind") and eventual reconciliation ("Mama called and I could hear her tears/Said daddy's fading, don't' know how long he has/Drove all night to get back home/Talk with him in his room alone/Laid to rest all the anger from the past").
It ends with that 2018 track, 'Good And Drunk', a song written in the aftermath of returning home from tour to find his ex had packed all his belongings for him to move out and about numbing the finality of his marriage ending with a bottle of whiskey - "Drove myself to the lawyers today/Picked up a pen and signed my wife away/Know I'll regret it but I don't know when/But with any luck, I'll be good and drunk by then".
Despite his songwriting pedigree and a solid reputation on America's country circuit, Davis is probably a more unknown quanity in international terms. If there's any justice and given the exposure it deserves, this album should put him up there with the best.
Mike Davies
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