Album Notes

AUSTIN AMERICAN STATESMAN review:

"An aging hipster doofus is chatting up the temp receptionist, an attractive and retiring young woman named Sarah Glynn. She mentions that she writes songs and fronts a group called Lucy and the Luck Band.

Later that evening, hipster doofus downloads an MP3 of Sarah's song 'All the Dogs,' from lucyandtheluck- band.com. He clicks 'play,' and the song is so catchy, the performance so accomplished, he does a 'take,' his eyes bulging and his jaw dropping to his chest.

Glynn, who moved to Austin a couple of years ago, wrote, performed, arranged and produced this debut disc of smart pop songs by herself (with the exception of a bassist on two tracks, there is no 'band,' lucky or otherwise, here). The 24-year-old exhibits such songwriting moxie and confident command of her multi-instrumental talent that her band could be The Next Big Thing, or at least The Next Big Thing After That.

'All the resolution came falling down/We're like two fireworks that never left the ground,' Glynn laments on 'Hey Now,' one of several tracks that might be looping in my head at any given moment. Her songwriting skills are strong; she knows how to use repetition to hook listeners with the familiar, and where to add a vocal bridge or a wah-wah guitar run to throw them a curve.

Her voice expresses a demure vulnerability, dispelled by smart, slightly acidic lyrics. 'I can't believe you,' she sings on 'You Cut,' 'You cut straight just like a knife/And if I trust you/You'll cut me seasoned and sliced.'

There are moments when too-sharp angles in the production sound more cold than clean, and if Glynn had enough confidence to resist multi-tracking her vocals so much, the songs might have more emotional immediacy. Presumably that's not a problem at her live shows, since Lucy and the Luck Band perform as a two guitars/bass/drums outfit. I'll find out soon enough, and I suspect my jaw will get another workout." Inside Line: 416-5700 (1744).

-- rich malley

AUSTIN CHRONICAL excerpt:

"Fronted by a mean axe-wielder with a delicate touch named Sarah Glynn, the Luck Band needn't rely on chance to snare fans with its intricate twin-guitar web."

-- kate messer

"You know just how much of something to put in a song so that the listener wants to hear it over & over"

-- sarah farrell, singer for Vida