Lori McKenna's ‘Heart Shaped Bullet Hole’ EP

This EP exudes the brilliance that is Lori McKenna.  As one of my favorite female songwriters, she always has songs that speak the truth in a heart wrenching way.  

“All It Takes” -- Takes the listener along on the memory train.  The memories she has of someone are reminders in her everyday life presented by the most ordinary of occurrences.  Every event has some association for the person.  This relates to all of our lives; whether it’s eating ice cream or a favorite artist/song growing up.  It takes you back to the place and time; it reminds you of spending time with specific people.  Some of the simplest things remind us and take us to that place.  This song is a wonderful description of how memories constantly follow us around.

“Whiskey and Chewing Gum” – In the intro of this song love is compared to whiskey and chewing gum.  She compares love to whiskey in the way that it isn’t right but it gets you drunk and numbs for a while, but will never make you complete.  Love is like chewing gum in the way that it’s good when it is fresh but it soon becomes tasteless. And you continue chewing even after the point.  Love is a difficult emotion to grasp and hold onto and this song is the struggle of trying to understand why it’s so hard to do.  The takeaway I have from this song is that when love is difficult it isn’t meant to be, and when it is meant to be, love is easy.  Love cannot be imagined, it just is.

“Sometimes He Does” -- This tune is about holding onto a relationship for the good moments that happen but are far and few between.   The woman in this song is clearly very saddened by the state of the love that is stale.  She talks about everything the guy doesn’t do, but the relationship is justified because sometimes he does them.  At times he is the prince charming of her world.  It puts a twist on what we all think of when thinking about what a relationship should be like.  It’s a cold relationship that has a faint glimmer of hope and the way she illustrates the dilemma is phenomenal.

“No Hard Feelings”—This track is about the struggles of breaking up and getting back together to try and make things work.  It seems that now is finally the last time for calling it quits.  Once love has left it is gone for good, and there is no recapturing it.  Walking away is difficult but it will make for the best outcome in the end.  There are no hard feelings for the ending of this relationship. 

“Heart Shaped Bullet Hole” – The title track on the album is an upbeat tune.  Having your heart broken is never a good thing and trying to cover it up is nearly impossible:  “But you can’t hide hurt in a yellow dress, it will soak right through.”  As it says in the song, love is dangerous and there is not really a way to protect oneself from getting hurt.  Eventually, you will move on but there will always be a scar that remains.  The song concludes with a wish for revenge, which is always sweet when someone has done you wrong.

“This and the Next Life” – Sometimes a stand still is reached with the person we’re in love with when there is nothing else to be to said or done.  Words have been spoken to improve the situation but have not been heard.  If there were an endless amount of time to resolve the relationship to be what it once was, then love would last for eternity.   This would be ideal, but in reality we know this isn’t possible.  Yet we continue to hope for love’s return.

This collection of songs is a job well done by Lori.  Her amazing vocals paired with honest lyrics brings emotion out of the listener.  It’s refreshing when something is said in a way that it hasn’t been before.  She is always wonderful at this, and the compositions on this album are representations of her incredible writing skills.

Download 'Heart Shaped Bullet Hole' on iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/heart-shaped-bullet-hole-ep/id567267463?uo=4