Pierce Pettis
State of Grace
Compass Records 743152

by William Michael Smith

He may not have the hair and he may not have the divorce decree autographed by Julia Roberts, but Alabaman Pierce Pettis has much in common musically with Lyle Lovett. In fact if you aren't paying strict attention when you push PLAY on Pettis's State of Grace, your ear may think it is listening to Mr. Lovett. "Rise From The Ruins" has a quick-stepping Texas country fiddle sound that has typified much of Lovett's work and Pettis's voice not only has Lovett's tone, it also has that lazy, jazzy hipster slyness that has become Lovett's trademark.

There are other similarities between the two artists. Pettis has a wonderful sense of arrangement and he writes songs with plenty of meat and depth and a certain air of spirituality about them. There is nothing flippant or casual in Pettis's work and, like Lovett, he refuses to be trapped by any one sound or genre. He works equally well in a country ensemble on tunes like "Rise From The Ruins," in adult contemporary soft rock on "State of Grace," in folk rock on "Long Way Back Home," in quiet folky ballads like "Georgia Moon," "Moontown," and "We Will Meet Again," and in pop-influenced folk like "A Mountaineer Is Always Free." Pettis even works in a funky country blues mode on the only cover on the CD, Bob Dylan's "Down In The Flood."

Across the entire range of his styles, Pettis constantly reinforces the sensation that he is a thoughtful, sensitive, serious poet, a man who looks deep and ponders long. Like any good poet, his imagery is well drawn and precise and his sense of pace and rhyme are spot on. And as with the best poets, his work continually confronts us with the eternal spiritual aspects that exist below the surface of the everyday and commonplace. In quiet, dramatic pieces like "Moontown" in particular, Pettis draws out and crystallizes these aspects as they pertain to small towns and rural living in the South. He infuses these situations with dignity and a noble loftiness that completely belies the myth of cosmopolitan sophistication, of some vague urban superiority. It's not a novel idea, but Pettis has the ability to phrase the idlyllic in novel ways that are entirely realistic and believable.

Tourists stop for gas
All heading southbound for Orlando
Wondering how we could ever stand it here
Stuck in this dry county, no Budweiser
No Black Label
But we can dream you under the table
Here in Moontown

Pettis also honors the South and his home state of Alabama throughout the album. The extensive liner note booklet features homey photographs of small town life and the lyrics are chock full of rich images of the Deep South. It is no accident that the title cut, "State of Grace", has two levels of meaning.

Oh I wash my hands
And I take my place
Bow my head
And clean my plate
I think and act
And I talk this way
For I was raised
In a state of grace

Well, I always know
Right where I am
From Muscle Shoals
Down to Birmingham
From the rolling hills
Clear to Mobile Bay
Where I come from
Is a state of grace

It takes touch and finesse to orchestrate Pettis's work and, like Lovett, Pettis has enough of a reputation and respect from the southern musical community to be able to draw upon some of the finest talent around for his soundscapes. On "Rise From The Ruins," the liveliest cut on the album, Stuart Duncan plays country fiddle like he's been playing West Texas dancehalls all his life. Pettis is also joined by such notables as Tim O'Brien on mandolin, Alison Brown on banjo, and Claire Lynch on harmony vocals. The ensembles vary from song to song, sometimes six pieces, sometimes just Pettis's acoustic guitar and the sparsest of accompaniment to give a dramatic or somber effect. But throughout the disc, the playing is impeccable and the arrangements are simple and absolutely appropriate for the subject matter at hand and compatible with Pettis's resonant Lovett-like voice.

Pettis wrote many of the songs on the album under the auspices of a fellowship from the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. The product of that time in Virginia has resulted in some incredibly smart and well-conceived lyrics, such as this scene from the poignant love song, "Georgia Moon."

Georgia moon
Hangin' down like a tear
From God's own eye
Laying low in the bottom of the sky
Sneaking up on me like a thief in the night
Every time it makes me think of you
Long ago beneath the Georgia moon

Pettis also touches deep on tradition and culture and the instinctual residues that lie deep in our being, the product of our environment and the defining marks it leaves on us without our knowledge or consent.

So deep into that landscape
We did not realize
That we had been talking in accents
All our lives
Just a vague sense
Of the world passing us by
Like out of state tags rolling down I-59

This song is just an echo
This song is just a ripple from a stone
That was
Tossed into the water long ago

Pettis has been a writer for major Nashville songwriting houses and while that experience certainly shows in the expert craftsmanship of his writing, his own performance work seems untouched by the experience. He has maintained an honest presentation that is completely without ostentation and flash or any superficial commercially oriented pandering. This guy couldn't dumb it down if he tried. If you like an honest day's work from a straightforward minstrel whose songs are filled with evocative poetry and heady, thoughtful, pleasing imagery that soothes and lifts up the soul, it is hard to go wrong with Pierce Pettis's State of Grace.

* You don't have to leave your state to get Pierce Pettis's State of Grace or his other two critically acclaimed albums, Everything Matters and Making Light of It. You don't have to go any further than www.compassrecords.com.



Contact William Michael Smith at: wms-at-rockzilla.net

 
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