I’m flying down Route 421, pedal not quite to the metal due to years-old construction that curves the road to such an extent that Siri barks “back to the route” again and again—as if I’ve departed the road for the sky. Traffic drums, concrete barriers, and stark “$250 additional fine” signs line the makeshift stretch, which zigs one way and then the next, all while cars, trucks and SUVs barrel closer to 75mph than the reduced 45 speed limit.
Norwegian singer-songwriter Malin Pettersen’s latest album, Wildflower, is my companion for the ride. There’s much on my mind, these days, from kittens to gravestones to the crazy times we find ourselves in, but somehow it becomes secondary to the music, which conjures country classics, the Gene Clark-era Byrds, and more. Leave aside the lyrics for a moment; Pettersen’s vocals flit high one moment and dive low the next, figurative honey flowing from the speakers, while her melodies sail like mini-luxury liners across relatively calm seas. Backing her is a crack band that includes Øyvind Blomstrøm (bass), Nikolai Grasaasen (guitar/piano), Stian Jørgen Sveen (pedal steel), and Sigmund Vestrheim (drums).
The lead-off track, “Carolina,” finds Pettersen offering advice and comfort to a friend who’s going through a rough relationship patch: “Through the ash of your heart, new life will rise.” The song opens with an airy acoustic arrangement that gradually clouds into a fierce electric storm; it reminds me to an extent of many an Emmylou Harris number from the late 1970s and early ‘80s. “Blue” adds a tinge of Lucinda into the mix, with crunchy guitars accenting the guttural sadness articulated in the lyrics. “Break Things” faces the mirror, reflecting how everything she touches turns the opposite of gold.
“Cargo” floats through space and time as if an unmoored buoy bobbing along on an ocean current; it’s the kind of gentle tune that leaves you hitting replay, calm on the surface but possessing a strong undertow. The title track maintains the lowkey mood, swapping the sea motif for that of a meadow. As with other songs, she digs into more than just love and life: “Let’s go running/Running in seasons/Let’s live in the now/And see how long this future might last/Let’s run, but not too fast.”
The infectious “Free,” which I spotlighted a while back, encourages listeners to toss off the ties that bind us: “Aren’t you tired my friend/of waking up yet again/to bonds and ties and restrictions/on how to live your life…” So much of modern life is driven by things we don’t need or want or agree with, with social-media scolds scattering the traffic drums and concrete barriers much as the North Carolina Department of Transportation did on the aforementioned Route 421. “Baptize Me,” meanwhile, sports a Bayou beat beneath its quest for transcendence—be it via love, religious, or both.
“Fool” embraces old-school pop, aka the peppy R&B-infused tunes of the late 1950s and early ‘60s, while “Number and a Street” recasts a track from her five-star Acoustic Acts of Rebellion set as a Byrds-like number. “Fold Out Chair,” meanwhile, swings like an Emmylou tune, with its lyrics—about the musician’s life—both tongue-in-cheek and serious. “Death in Space,” the album closer, floats through the fifth dimension: “Can you believe/All the particles in space/Rearranged to be your face/A planet and a star/And all the things we are….” In school, at least as I experienced it, science was taught as a clinical subject devoid of philosophical concerns; it was all about memorization. Something tells me, however, that if Pettersen had been my teacher, I’d now be a theoretical physicist.
Driving along 421 on Saturday reminded me that songs and albums are akin to the flowers Pettersen sings about on the title track: “Picture petals so strong/A stem belonging to all and no one/Nobody knows where the seed flew/To cover the meadow in a wildflower hue.” Wildflower is a remarkable album, the result of seeds carried by wind gusts from the long ago to the present. It’s one of my favorites of the year.
The Old Grey Cat 
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