Review: Joan Osborne Gets Reflective on the Pensive ‘Nobody Owns You’

Joan Osborne
Nobody Owns You
(Womanly Hips Records)
3 out of 5 stars

Life has been a long, strange trip for singer/songwriter/interpreter Joan Osborne, and not just because she once sang backup on a Grateful Dead tour.

Turning 60 last year caused Osborne to review and reconsider her life; where she is, what she has done, and where she wants to go. On this, her eleventh album and first of original material (all self-penned or with a co-writer) since 2020, she does that and more. These songs range from commenting on America’s troubling socio-political situation (“Great American Cities,” “Time of the Gun”) to giving advice to her daughter in the strummy feminist anthem title track.

Co-producer/engineer/mixer and occasional songwriter Ben Rice keeps the sound on the darker, side, especially on the cautionary “Dig a Little Ditch” where thumping drums, Osborne’s stern vocals (Dig a little ditch/And push the devil in) and some eerie backing vocals from Catherine Russell and Rachel Yamagata provide an appropriate edge for a song that encourages the listener to get busy confronting their own demons. Those supporting singers also bring the church on the country-infused “Child of God” as Osborne reminds us that everyone is the titular person and Well you learn pretty fast / The role you been cast / We all wind up under the sod.

She gets melancholy on the soft, folksy, acoustic “Secret Wine” requesting a higher spirit to look kindly on her as she juggles life’s struggles. Osborne asks the listener to do good deeds and assist someone, singing on the muted “Lifeline” You can throw someone a lifeline/Shine a single shaft of sun/You can live an entire lifetime/Never know the good you’ve done.

Osborne is in typical robust voice throughout, Rice’s production is appropriately subtle if needed and more vivid when required, but some selections don’t connect melodically. Rather they seem to be vessels communicating Osborne’s copious words, often without catchy choruses that beckon you back for another spin. There is little of the frisky soul or funk that made Osborne’s albums of R&B, Motown, and oldie pop covers so successful, replaced by a somber, pensiveness.

Lyrically she can get awkward too, singing Oh the smallest trees/Hold such beautiful birds…then understanding that Now my days grow short/I won’t get much more. Sometimes the words and music dovetail effortlessly as on the slinking “Time of the Gun,” but there aren’t enough of those moments.

Still, it’s good to have her back. Osborne is clearly committed to her causes and, perhaps now that this reflection is out of her system, she can return to more exuberant, less weighty music that she connects with so effectively.