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But while traditional country has leaned toward booze, trucks and stadium-scale bombast, Musgraves prefers delicacy, detail and ironically subverting small-town expectations. The title track from their second album, “Parade material” explained, “It’s not that I don’t care about world peace/But I don’t see how I can fix it in a swimsuit on stage.”
His music values understatement, bypassing standard Nashville sounds and often harking back to the Laurel Canyon folk-pop of the ’70s. Like songwriters and producers of that era, Musgraves is immersed in folk music. and apparently it is a diary, but it is also unassumingly familiar with pop structures and studio possibilities.
In “Star-Crossed,” Musgraves sang about marriage pressures, professional jealousy, facing memories and moving on. The music went far beyond country, incorporating surreal electronica and sensual R&B. “Deeper Well” is simpler and less decidedly eclectic. Written and produced with Musgraves’ longtime collaborators Daniel Tashian and Ian Fitchuk, the album highlights acoustic guitars and organic, seemingly transparent arrangements; every instrument shines. While the album was recorded in New York City (at Electric Lady Studios), it is a world away from the urban hustle and bustle; the music always feels pastoral.
Gratitude is at the center of the new songs. Musgraves may be pleased, but she is not complacent. She finds omens in nature on “Cardinal,” the album’s opener, which harkens back to the Byrds’ modal folk-rock, complete with 12-string guitar. Seeing a cardinal after the death of a friend, she asks him, “Are you bringing me a message from the other side?”
On “Dinner with Friends,” he lists little things he likes – “the way the sun on my floor makes a pattern of light” – and delivers a political jab, appreciating: “My home state of Texas/The sky there, the horses and the dogs,” before adding: “But none of their laws.” And in “The Architect,” a crystalline waltz with string bands, she marvels at natural phenomena (an apple, the Grand Canyon) and the miracle of finding new love, which makes her reflect on the existence of a God: “This life we live, is it random or destiny? she asks. “Is there an architect?”