Tift Merritt has always had one foot in the music of Emmylou Harris and one in the songs of Bonnie and Delaney, and most of her soul in the 1970's. She has spent most of her career dancing back and forth between the two. Bramble Rose and Another Country warmed to her country heart, while Tambourine was a celebration of her R&B soul. With See You On the Moon, Merritt fuses heart and soul with her folk sensibilities and a touch of pop polish. While it is not as immediately engaging an album as her earlier work, its musical and emotional complexity make it shine as bright as and gem in her collection.

The album opens with the funky, slinky groove of the lead off single “Mix Tape,” a charming tune about spending the whole day collecting songs and decorating those little paper inserts so a loved one listen to her heart with automatic replay. Its the single youthful note on an otherwise grown up album. Most of the rest of the songs tread the same territory of her last album, a woman in the midst of her life trying to make all of the pieces fit together. “I don't know how to fix the world,” she begins Engine to Turn, before suggesting “Maybe the world feels like me, wishing someone would sing it a song, about how there's a lot of good here, about how its done nothing wrong.” “Six More Days Of Rain” finds her looking at humanity and marveling at their ability to persevere. Merritt found fertile writing ground in her recent marriage to drummer Zeke Hutchins. “The Things That Everybody Does” is a view of marriage from a woman who thought that it was something that only other people did. “All The Reasons We Don't Have to Fight” is something between a make up song and a plea for peace. Two of the strongest songs on the album find Merritt dealing with loss. “Feel of the World” is a haunting ballad about her grandmother's death. More poignant yet is the title track, that uses the moon as a metaphor for the afterlife while she contemplates her own aging and the death of a childhood friend. “April is a fine month, thought you'd be around for June,” she muses, “though we never really promised, I'll see you on the moon.”

When Tift Merritt first came on the music scene in 2002 she was more than a breath of fresh air.  She was a spring zephyr bringing the scent of Mountain Laurel and Lilacs down into an exhaust clogged city. With her soft soprano evocative songwriting, there has always been something ethereal about Merritt's music. She has a gift for writing delicate lyrics about the biggest issues in life, wrapped in deceptively simple metaphors. See You On the Moon continues the tradition of one of the great chroniclers of our time setting her fables to some of the most gorgeous songs .

You can support Tift Merritt by purchasing this album at Amazon (mp3)| Amazon (CD)| iTunes.