The term country rock is always one, like most genre tags, to be fair, which falls short of its task, conjuring either rock hands who have just thrown a fiddle in the mix to attract the Americana crowd or a country band cranking up the guitars to embrace the alt-country scene, the music often falling unsatisfactorily between the two sounds. Often, but not always, Lisa Benedetto, in the guise of her musical alter ego, Willow Layne, shows us exactly how and where those two genres dance deftly and perfectly together.
The Roots Run Deep is a collection of songs infused with country and Americana, roots and rock influences, and it chronicles a deeply personal period of transformation in the artist’s life, a time when love and loss, faith, resilience, and hope were all being explored. Intimate questions were asked, but the answers found are universal.
It is an album further inspired and infused by the beautiful vistas of the Delaware Water Gap, not to mention the everyday moments that shape all of our lives. The result is an album that offers lyrical comfort as much as sonic companionship, proving that sometimes the right song can help us find our way home.
The album opens with ‘Keep Love Safe,’ a fine way to grab the listener’s attention and a perfect example of how effortlessly country music can merge with rock. The narrative stance and emotional nuance of the former bring a depth and elegance, while the latter lends the songs a sense of scale and momentum. Grace meets groove! Fiddles weave gracefully around chiming guitars, acoustic textures ripple across electrified soundscapes, and the result is both authentically rooted and anthemically uplifting.
The contrasting ‘Under That Hat’ steps back into more recognisably traditional country territory, allowing its warm melodies and unhurried charm to take centre stage. Yet even here, Benedetto avoids nostalgia for its own sake, instead reaffirming the timely and timeless qualities of the canon of great songwriting. Then comes ‘Lost’, perhaps the album’s most accomplished balancing act. It remains firmly grounded in Americana and roots traditions while possessing the widescreen ambition and anthemic sweep of stadium-ready rock, proving that music doesn’t have to abandon its heritage to sound expansive.
‘Like the Rain’ provides a welcome pause, a gentle and indeed genteel ballad that lets emotion do the heavy lifting. ‘Walk Away’ is roots rock writ large, the sort of heartland anthem Tom Petty might have revelled in had he explored the Southern rock heritage of his home state rather than heading west. ‘Walk Away’ was created in collaboration with singer-songwriter Don Kincaid, whose heartfelt lyrics were honoured, interpreted and recorded. ‘There Isn’t a Moon’ is dreamy, beautiful, and romantically romantic. At the same time, ‘You Got a Guy for That’ reminds us that country music has always excelled at mixing wit with wisdom, humour with heartfelt emotion.
The Roots Run Deep is an album built on authenticity rather than artifice, and Lisa Benedetto writes with the honesty of someone who has lived every lyric. At the same time, the music finds the natural sonic bridges that link country, Americana and rock and wanders freely back and forth via them. It is an album that celebrates resilience, finds beauty in everyday moments, and reminds us that, to a large degree, we are who we are because we come from where we come from.
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