Joy'all in Bloomington, MN

Early in
Joy'All
,
Jenny Lewis
sings "My forties are kicking my ass, and handing them to me in a margarita glass," a line that suggests that this, her fifth solo record, would be a chronicle of middle-aged woes. That interpretation necessitates ignoring the fact that
Lewis
prominently places "joy" in the title of her record, an indication of its sound, spirit, and sentiment. The accompanying "'All" shouldn't be ignored, either, as it's a tip of the hat to Nashville, the town
sometimes calls home since she bought a house in the Music City in 2017, splitting her time between Nashville and her native Los Angeles. It sounds like the city's started to seep into her blood, if
can be trusted. Recorded with producer
Dave Cobb
in Nashville's legendary RCA Studio A, the album has a polished professionalism that radiates warmth, its sunniness suggesting 1970s radio of both the AM and FM variety more than anything modern. The writing process behind
also vaguely resembles the professional songwriter rooms of Nashville. In the thick of the COVID-19 pandemic,
joined a Zoom songwriting workshop orchestrated by
Beck
, one where the participants wrote new tunes according to prompts handed out to the group at large. It's a method not a million miles removed from the music industry in the '50s or '60s, where professional songwriters wrote songs on assignment. Here,
carried her contributions into the studio with
Cobb
, letting them form the heart of
. Although these songs are not lacking in autobiographical elements, they still bear the outlines of being made-to-order -- there's a song about the road, there's a blues boogie, etc. -- but this is a blessing, as it frees
up to play with her storytelling while relaxing into the burnished groove created by these studio rats. Throughout the record,
makes a conscious decision to embrace joy, not sorrow, which means hints of melancholy are resolved within a verse and ballads aren't quite forlorn. Mostly, it means that
hums to a rhythm that's happy, if not quite beatific:
bears her sorrows and scars proudly, which makes the sepia-toned positivity of the album feel earned. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine