If Lauren Barth is not on your music radar then this song should switch you on to someone who is a rare talent. ‘Durango‘ is a song for which the term epic was coined, it’s a piece of music which has gone full in on its Laurel Canyon influences and come up with a song to sit alongside the best of them. It’s from the album ‘Stormwaiting‘ which was released on April 14th on the Spiritual Pajamas label. It starts off in a whoozy mood, with Lauren arth singing “I’m drawing shadows on walls / My baby’s still gone / And it’s much too late to go home /Guess I’ll drive to Durango / Spent so many hours awake with you / Now I’ll never sleep, now I’ll never sleep again.” As the song progresses it moves from this blissed out in love mood to an awakening to a new life beckoning – there’s no point going home now “I’m just living down in Mexico now.”
Why does Lauren Beth sound so good – well she’s channeling the right influences claiming Bert Jansch, Incredible String Band, Fairport Convention, Nick Drake, and Pentangle, and the later American progressive folk music of Jeff Buckley, Joni Mitchell, and early Bonnie Raitt. But – and this is important – she has her own twist on that folk-influenced sound. And it is a good twist.
