Listening to current Nashville resident Imogen Clark’s latest, Choking On Fuel, you’d swear she was a native who got her start playing dive bars around town before finally getting booked at The Bluebird Café or The Basement East. Surprisingly, Clark got her start as a teen playing bars in Sydney, Australia, not exactly the most obvious jumping off spot for a rising country/Americana star. Regardless, Choking On Fuel is an impressive collection.
Clark has spent the past few years on the road, headlining as well as opening for a slew of disparate musicians ranging from Robyn Hitchcock and Steve Poltz to fellow Aussie Andrew Farriss (formerly of INXS and currently wading into Country music). With Choking On Fuel Clark has tried to replicate the energy and intensity of those live shows. And she does a remarkable job of it.
The album opener, “All Hard Feelings,” with Blake O’Connor and Sinead Burgess providing backing vocals, sets the pace, but it’s on the song “Sebastian,” with Clark backed by the Australian Bluegrass band Midnight Chicken, that the album really takes on the feel of a live show. The music perfectly showcases her powerful range. Elsewhere, “The Last Of Me” is another formidable track with the emotion compounding as the song builds. Along with O’Connor and Burgess, Clark brings in a slew of different guests like Willie Nelson’s longtime harmonica player Mickey Raphael on “The Art of Getting Through”; Jim Lauderdale and Tommy Immanuel “If Your Heart Never Breaks”; and Ella Hooper on “If I Want In”. The album closes on a beautifully mournful version of Sheryl Crow’s “If It Makes You Happy,” completely reinventing the ‘90s radio staple.
Clark already has close to half a dozen records to her name, but Choking On Fuel feels like she is reestablishing herself as an artist. She’s spent the past decade on the road playing to audiences across the globe, and she finally has a record that truly reflects the feel of those live sets. Appropriately enough, she plans on hitting the road again next month, starting off in Nashville before touring the UK.
