MANDY MOOREAmanda Leigh
(Storefront/Red Ink)
*** 1/2 (out of 5)
I became a Mandy Moore convert in 2003 after listening to her album Coverage, a thoroughly delightful, well-curated collection of covers of classic pop songs, including XTC’s “Senses Working Overtime,” Joan Armatrading’s “Drop the Pilot,” and Joe Jackson’s “Breaking Us in Two.” Now, on her new album Amanda Leigh, she’s written a classic pop song of her own: “I Could Break Your Heart Any Day of the Week,” whose effortless melody and witty lyrics even Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields would be proud to claim as his own.
It’s probably important to say that Moore co-wrote the song; like every track on Amanda Leigh, she shares credit with Mike Viola, a prolific pop songwriter best known for composing all the “Dewey Cox” songs in the John C. Reilly comedy Walk Hard. But this disc is no joke: it’s a lovely piece of sunshiney California pop — Carole King by way of Norah Jones — and despite all the sexpot photos in the lyrics booklet, Moore convincingly sells every last “I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her” lyric. Give the album a chance and, as Moore sings on “Merrimack River,” “Don’t say you’re not amazed when you know you are.”
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