Starter Home

A starter home is where a couple begins to live out its dreams yet the term is a contradiction of sorts. A home suggests permanence but the starter modifier acknowledges this dwelling is temporary: a place that will serve as the launching pad to greater things, or perhaps lead to a premature end. As a former carpenter, singer/songwriter Doug Paisley understands the power of habitats and as a writer, he's keenly attuned to habits of humans. Starter Home, his fourth album, finds Paisley deliberately mining the intimacies that exists within a relationship and how physical spaces can accentuate or erode those connections. Paisley's nine tales of the heart are subtly etched and softly delivered -- a listener may need to lean into the speaker to discern the narratives -- but there's no distancing effect at play in the production. Hushed though it may be, Starter Home is a cozy, even comforting, collection of burnished roots music that feels a bit like a musical version of reclaimed wood: it draws upon tradition and is spun into something tasteful, handsome, and fresh. Such complexities are why Starter Home is so resonant: it's an album that reveals a little bit more of itself with each listen. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine