Fireproof

iTunes Review

Dawn Landes second album was recorded to her laptop and stored on her hard drive when her Brooklyn apartment was burglarized and her equipment stolen. Waiting for the police to arrive to fill out the report, she wrote “Bodyguard,” the opening track of Fireproof, the album this Kentucky-bred songwriter eventually recorded in the lost, stolen album’s place. The initial tracks were laid down in a single day to analog tape followed by a week of tweaking and overdubs from Landes who had been supporting herself as a recording engineer for Ryan Adams, Joseph Arthur and other top-drawer songwriters. The occasional lazy lyric or errant vocal note aside, there is a great simple poignancy to many of the songs here that suggests a less manipulative Liz Phair at work. ”Dig Me A Hole” and “I’m In Love With the Night” and “You Alone” immediately capture a sublime loneliness in their melodies while their lyrics take snapshots of simple everyday rituals that make life easier to handle amidst the chaos.