Music Review: Brandi Carlile looks inward on the great 'Returning to Myself'

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It’s been 20 years since Brandi Carlile released her self-titled debut album. After two decades of extensive collaborations and accolades for her music that blends folk, alt-country, rock and Americana, she’s stripped back again for the great “Returning to Myself.”

What the title means for Carlile varies across the project. Just months after her buzzy collaborative album with Elton John, and years after the debut of her Americana supergroup The Highwomen, Carlile's vocals stand alone again — save the occasional backing vocal from Bon Iver’s Justin Vernon. That pensive performance takes on many forms: reflective, on “You Without Me,” about watching her children grow and become independent, and soulful, on “A Woman Oversees,” her rich tone heard above the electric notes of a Rhodes piano. But the project also serves as a celebration of her collaborators and the influences that have shaped her.

Carlile is aware of that dichotomy. “Why is it heroic to untether? / How is alone some holy grail?” she asks on the title track, her voice crisp over strummed acoustic guitar. Later, she realizes: “Returning to myself is just returning me to you.”

Andrew Watt, Aaron Dessner and Vernon produce the album, which was written with Carlile's longtime collaborators Phil and Tim Hanseroth. The full group comes together for “Human,” an anthemic, electric guitar-set ballad.

Dessner's more intimate approach, most frequently recognized as the production style he contributed to Taylor Swift's “folklore,” gives “A War with Time” a melancholic inflection. Watt takes on the bolder tracks: “No One Knows Us” is backed by a full band while the standout “Church & State,” a roaring ballad about renewed tensions, feels the closest in sound to Carlile's collaboration with John.

On “Joni,” a sentimental highlight, Carlile honors the great Joni Mitchell. Carlile was key in orchestrating the “Joni Jams” that brought Mitchell back into public performance after her 2015 brain aneurysm, including a surprise performance at the 2022 Newport Folk Festival.

“I knew a wild woman / She threw a party on her grave,” Carlile recounts over a chorus of guitars. Her lyrics are revealing, depicting Mitchell, now 81, as both a grounded and mythic figure. For example: “She spoke in sacred language / Every soul could understand.” Energy builds toward the song's end, when the acoustic guitar, played in a way that emulates Mitchell's own folk style, is joined by beckoning drums and a surprising saxophone riff.

An ode of this sort may seem out of place on such an introspective album. But its inclusion, and lyrics, say as much about Carlile as they do about her muse.

Carlile can't “untether” to find herself because she, like Mitchell, is a connector. And that's a story she's been telling since her debut.

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“Returning to Myself” by Brandi Carlile

Four stars out of five.

On repeat: “Joni”

Skip it: “Anniversary”

For fans of: Joni Mitchell, “Folklore,” journaling by candlelight