Darden Smith - Native Soil & Trouble No More & Field Of Crowes & Love Calling (1986-2013)

A fine debut album. Nanci Griffith sings harmony vocal on "Two Dollar Novels." Lyle Lovett sings harmony on five songs. This one's a gem. Smith is just breaking out and developing his style.

A strong album, not as diverse as Darden Smith, but as good. Contains "Midnight Train," "Frankie & Sue," "Trouble No More," "Fall Apart at the Seams," and the list goes on. With two songs co-written with buddy Boo Hewerdine.

In the 20 years since the release of his debut album, Darden Smith has grown from just another promising modern country artist into a singer/songwriter blessed with an uncommon degree of intelligence, depth, and compassion. Released in 2006, Field of Crows is a few shades lighter than his previous album, Circo, but it remains a musically low-key set that's dominated by subtle textures and aims for a deeper atmosphere over the typical singer/songwriter's guitar-driven arrangements (Roscoe Beck's bass, Steuart Smith's keyboards, and José Galeaño's percussion carry the album's most effective song, "Mary"). It's significant that the album's most upbeat number celebrates "the Golden Age of pain," and the final number, "All That I Wanted," ends with the sound of one side of an argument between two lovers -- Field of Crows is dominated by love songs in which love is rarely a simple or comfortable thing. But Smith isn't wallowing in bad vibes here, just giving listeners an accurate portrait of the playing field of the heart, and "Wide Open," "Satisfied," and "It Takes Two" deal with romance on a grownup's terms when things happen to work out after all. As a singer, Smith knows how to make the most of his lyrics with his rich but limber pipes, and he and producer Stewart Lerman have crafted a fine and expressive piece of work -- Field of Crows is an album from an artist who has only improved with time and is still revealing new sides of his musical personality.

Songwriting is at the heart of everything that Texas-born Americana singer-songwriter Darden Smith does and his Compass debut Love Calling is perhaps the finest example of his craft since his hit album Little Victories in 1993. Love Calling, recorded in Nashville and produced by Gary Paczosa and Jon Randall Stewart, features 11 new songs — including the already critically acclaimed Radney Foster co-write “Angel Flight”—that seamlessly interweave rock, pop, and country with folk and Americana. Recently featured as a TEDxAustin speaker, Darden’s creativity reaches in many directions including teaching and philanthropy. He is an artist in residence at Oklahoma State University, as well as the founder of the SongwritingWith: and Be An Artist Programs, both of which use collaborative songwriting to help anyone from soldiers to abused children deal with their emotional trauma.

"Blessed with a seemingly effortless melodic gift and one of the warmest, most penetrating vocal deliveries in American music” —No Depression