Something About Knowing, the fifth long-player from Alabama-based singer/songwriter
Maria Taylor (
Azure Ray,
Orenda Fink), is also her first outing as a new mother, so it should come as little surprise that there is an air of glowing contentment that permeates the ten-track collection of easy-to-digest, country-folk/indie pop confections. Recorded both pre and post-maternity,
Something About Knowing bristles with equal parts anticipation and bliss, with the former hanging over the hymn-like “Broken Objects” like an overcast sky in mid-May, and the latter illuminating the amiable, quietly propulsive opener “Folk Song Melody” like a late afternoon, post-storm sunbeam, with both sentiments reaching consensus on the bouncy, unapologetically hopeful title track. Working again with producer/multi-instrumentalist
Mike Mogis, who was an essential part of her well-received first two solo outings, 2005’s
11:11 and 2007’s
Lynn Teeter Flower,
Something About Knowing retains many of the hazy dream pop undertones that informed her earlier work, while introducing a more streamlined, radio-ready patina that imbues standout cuts like the sweet-tempered closer “Lullaby for You,” the dreamy “Saturday in June,” and the bluesy, barroom floor stomper “Up All Night,” the latter a giddy rave-up that fuses the breezy melodiousness of
Rilo Kiley onto a fiery, “Revolution”-era
Beatles-inspired foundation, with a warm and winning current of urban Americana and evocative, two-lane-highway country-pop.