Music Review: Annie Mack’s Testify
Annie Mack’s new EP is a genre-defying triumph
For a lot of my life, my musical focus was fairly narrow—which is to say, if it wasn’t country music that sounded like it was made between 1930 and 1970, it was viewed with suspicion.
Luckily for me, I’ve started to appreciate how much amazing music out there has elements of the straight-up country I love but branches out, modernizing the sound without losing it, and fusing it with other genres. Country-rock, country-folk, and even country-punk acts have won me over and broken my musical perspective wide open.
So when I clicked to listen to Annie Mack’s Testify, which kept showing up in my Instagram feed with an #americana tag, I wasn’t suspicious when the acoustic guitar was quickly joined by funky keyboards and drums. Instead I was instantly intrigued, wondering how these sounds were going to meld with Americana music.
And from the first note she sang, I was completely ready to give the whole EP a chance. Mack has one of those voices that taps directly into the pleasure centers of the brain. My first thought was “Ooh, she hit that Bill Withers nerve.” I always get this tingle down my spine every time I hear Bill Withers’s voice, and not many other artists have that effect on me. Annie Mack does.
Once I dug into the record, I was almost as blown away by her masterful working of genres. Even someone like me with a limited range of knowledge could tell there were many influences at work, blended together to create something unique.
The first song, “Testify,” has a bluesy gospel feel that showcases Mack’s incredible voice. As I’d discover when I started reading up on Mack, she’s well-established in the blues scene, so this made complete sense. The rest of the brief record, though, is packed with genre-defying surprises.
The next song, “Get On The Train,” has a Bo Diddley-style beat, punctuated with electric guitar, and a chugging momentum that matches the lyrics about not being afraid to leave baggage behind in the search for something new:
Go see what this world has to show you
And remember you got things to show this old world too
Get on the train
And don’t look back
There’s freedom waiting on the tracks
Annie Mack EP single “Shadows of a Kingdom” artwork, courtesy of artist’s website.
“Shadows of a Kingdom” shifts into an easy 70s rock vibe reminiscent of Dire Straits or the Eagles. As I was swept along by the effortless tempo, I realized the lyrics were about a woman confronting crisis and oppression and rising above it: “And in this troubled and lost land / She’d begin to lead.”
This is where I started to realize that one of the most thrilling aspects of this record for me was how it uses elements of genres that I think of as white-male-dominated but turns them on their head with incisive lyrics that speak directly to women, especially Black women.
Up to this point, the Americana element had been present but subtle throughout. And then the fourth song came on and I lost my country-music-loving mind. “Judge and Jury” could’ve been made by Waylon Jennings, the outlaw country sound was so strong. But instead of lyrics about womanizing or male swagger, it’s a defiant statement about being tired of judgement, scrutiny and, most pointedly, the gaslighting of false sympathy:
You talk of compassion
As if it must come in rations
I see you with your nose up in the air
Hell bent on saving me
All your false humility
Where were you when I had my cross to bear
These great, universal lyrics could be aimed at a particular person, a racially biased police force, the patriarchy, or society as a whole. Mack smartly tones down her powerful voice and lets the atmospheric music and lyrics take the lead. Needless to say, this is my favorite song on the EP.
The final song, “Walking Around,” has a relaxed 70s funk feel, complete with horns, and is the perfect follow-up to the dark sound and cutting lyrics of “Judge and Jury.” By contrast, this song feels like stepping into the fresh air of a new day, having successfully overcome everything that came before. The optimism comes through not only in the music but in the stirring lyrics:
Looking in the mirror I refuse to turn away
I’m digging what I see, I’m no longer afraid
I feel the rain fall, fall upon my face
I can’t help but smile ’cause I know that I’ve changed
Suffice it to say, after this short but powerful introduction to Annie Mack, I’m an instant fan. I think she’s going to gain a lot of fans from all sorts of genres with this release, because it has something for everyone.
Annie Mack, courtesy of artist’s website
Carol Roth. Photo credit: Dan Lee.
Carol Roth is a full-time marketing copywriter and the main music journalist and social media publicist for Adventures in Americana. In addition to studying the guitar and songwriting, Carol’s additional creative side hustle is writing self-proclaimed “trashy” novels under the pseudonym @taberkeley!
