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| Avclub |
 Southern singer-songwriter Tift Merritt has garnered comparisons to Maria McKee, Caitlin Cary, and Lucinda Williams over the course of her decade-plus in the business, and like them, Merritt has had to grapple with how to make a pretty voice and a set of solid country-rock influences into something listeners haven’t heard a thousand times before. On her last album, 2008’s Another Country, Merritt dodged the issue and embraced traditionalism, recording a set of tastefully arranged, vividly soulful ballads and mid-tempo rockers. With the follow-up, See You On The Moon, though, Merritt engages alt-rock super-producer Tucker Martine to bring a little edge, and the collaboration bears fruit from the album’s first song, “Mixtape,” a jumpy little number with a handclap beat, swooping strings, and a muted jump-rope-chant chorus.See You On The Moon still occasionally veers toward the kind of generic lite-roots music that dominates rom-com soundtracks and commercials for long-distance service, but more often, Merritt tries to do a little more with what she has, whether she’s singing a sunny song of healing in “Engine To Turn” or marveling at human persistence in the punchy “Six More Days Of Rain.” “Mixtape”’s soft urgency carries over into songs like “Never Talk About It,” where Merritt repeats the title over and over in a haze, as though it were a nagging notion she wanted to exorcise. And Merritt maintains that mood throughout: anxious to discard what’s weighing her down, yet unwilling to completely let go. ...full text |
| Allmusic |
| Tift Merritt has become unexpectedly (and thankfully) prolific since she signed with Fantasy Records in 2008, after going four years without releasing a record. See You on the Moon is her third album in as many years, and from the first track, the gentle and soul-infused love song "Mixtape," she demonstrates that she can maintain solid quality control at this pace and does so with ease. See You on the Moon is a more spare and intimate-sounding set than 2008's Another Country, as if she learned a bit about the value of concision with her 2009 solo acoustic live set Buckingham Sunday, but Merritt clearly works well with others (the backing musicians are uniformly great, and Jim James of My Morning Jacket contributes some solid harmonies on "Feel of the World"), and while the arrangements wisely avoid cluttering the clean landscapes of her melodies, producer and engineer Tucker Martine gives the recordings a full-bodied sound even when the performances are purposefully simple. As on Merritt's other albums, the real key to See You on the Moon lies in her songs and her voice, and both are in splendid form here; Merritt has a lovely natural instrument, but she never relies on beauty for its own sake, letting a range of emotional shadings color the tunes, and with a subtle catch in her voice or a bend in her pitch, she can break your heart and mend it again moments later. And Merritt writes about the pains and satisfactions of love with an eloquence and articulate simplicity that will draw you in if you give her half a chance; "Papercut" is as telling a metaphor of a hurtful relationship as anyone has conjured in a while, and "Mixtape" is not only lovely but should earn her the loyalty of analog-loving music geeks around the world. (Merritt also includes two well-chosen covers, a forceful take on Emitt Rhodes' "Live to You Die" and a version of Kenny Loggins' "Danny's Song" that cuts the treacle of the best-known recordings while maintaining its emotional power.) There's a modesty in Tift Merritt's music that makes it more compelling than a lot of artists who make a grand show of their joy and/or grief, and See You on the Moon finds Merritt weaving her spell as effectively as ever; it's marvelous music well worth your time and attention....full text |
| Pitchfork |
| At one point on her disappointing 2008 album, Another Country, alt-country songstress Tift Merritt claims, "It isn't very often that I say just what I mean." Much of the reason for that record's mediocrity can be explained by that line, as Merritt's willowy voice and limp folk-pop hooks found themselves floating off entirely into the ether upon being paired with frustratingly vague, moony lyrics choked with overcooked metaphors ("Night is a gypsy;" "I ran like the wildest horse"). Leaning hard on blithe mid-tempo grooves and useless pleasantries, Merritt was in danger of writing herself off wholly into benign irrelevance, a Sheryl Crow with some indie cred. Blessedly, however, her newest album, See You on the Moon, finds Merritt finally figuring out how to say just what she means, taking full advantage of her gift for intimate, fragile songwriting by attaching it to words that speak quietly but directly to real states of love, both in union and in discord. Wonderful opener "Mixtape" is about something as modest as showing love through song selection, and when Merritt breaks out the metaphors it's to charmingly liken herself to a B-side, not a galloping stallion. Meanwhile, the mid-album one-two punch of "Never Talk About It" and "All the Reasons We Don’t Have to Fight" not only ruminate on strained relationships but also mimc their syntax; like estranged couples walking on eggshells afraid to trigger another eruption, the songs leave out the details and stick to language that's neutral on the surface but secretly freighted with emotion. In general the album is somber and reflective, and it consistently suits Merritt well. Even when her imagination is given freer rein here, it's in the service of sincere meditation rather than glib pronouncement-- Merritt may imagine "my typewriter strapped with diamonds to my chest" on "The Things That Everybody Does", but she also self-deprecatingly concedes, "a mountain's still a mountain…no matter what I’d like it to be."...full text |
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