Rosanne Cash, With a Dash of Seasoning : *** 1/2, ROSANNE CASH, “10 Song Demo”, Capitol

I’ve got a woman’s life

And it means everything to me.

*

That stark declaration, coming as it does near the end of Rosanne Cash’s brilliant new album, is no less powerful for its superfluousness. After 11 songs (never mind the album’s title) chronicling what it means to be female and 40 (or thereabouts), it’s obvious to the listener that Cash would not have it any other way.

Which is not to say that “10 Song Demo” is all sunshine and lollipops--far from it. But Cash’s tunes of womanly woe exude maturity. They’re composed from the perspective of one who has already experienced all the hurt a man can heap on a woman and survived to see another day--and love another man.

As a result, the vitriol that girded some of her earlier work and that fuels such younger female artists as Alanis Morissette is absent, replaced by a slightly world-weary wisdom. Cash knows that this relationship stuff could all be so simple: “If I were a man, I’d be so sweet / I’d give me everything I need.”

The power of Cash’s lyrics is illuminated by the barely-there acoustic instrumentation. Demos these may be, but it’s hard to imagine how these songs could be improved on with any more production.

*

New albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent).

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Rosanne Cash *5722

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