We should all be thankful musicians find writing songs to be cathartic. Amy Speace has taken inspiration from the first birthday of her son, and the passing of her father, to deliver an emotional, passionate new record. Entitled There Used To Be Horses Here, it’s a natural fit for vinyl with two pretty distinct parts making up the release.
Side A is a tribute to her father, and a reckoning with his death. Down the Trail leads off with a gentle folk sound painting the picture of her dad’s stories and a dream that would become a metaphor for him dying. The title track really highlights Speace’s soaring vocals in a beautiful remembrance of the trip back home to see dad. Hallelujah Train is a figurative expression about going to heaven, and the mix of gospel and folk gives the band a chance to show their chops. Save that tune, this part of the record makes extensive use of strings, and the symphonic sound adds a timelessness that seems appropriate.
Side B showcases Speace’s vocal and songwriting talents in a very different way. These songs are less pensive and more, I don’t know, outgoing. Give Me Love is not so much a love song as a falling-in-love song. Shotgun Hearts leans a little more to the rock/pop spectrum and highlights the perspective that comes from being young and having your life just starting to unfold. River Rise tells of the experience of the Tennessee River flooding, and Speace turns the anger of the event unfolding into a protest song against the fecklessness of Mother Nature. The album ends with a cover of Warren Zevon’s Don’t Let Us Get Sick. Speace makes it an anthem for us all during the pandemic and Zevon’s wish that “don’t let us get sick…don’t let us get stupid.”
There’s a temptation to think, with half the record about her father’s passing, this will be a melancholy listen. Don’t give in to that temptation. Speace has used a front-and-center inclusion of strings, along with her dynamic voice, to instead make those songs beautiful and atmospheric and somehow upbeat. The second set of songs is then just icing on an already impressive cake. Speace won some song of the year awards with her last project and it’s title track, Me And the Ghost Of Charlemagne. There Used To Be Horses Here is a worthy successor.
About the author: I've actually driven from Tehatchapee to Tonopah. And I've seen Dallas from a DC-9 at night.