Description:	LP on Sketchbook
	Format:	LP (vinyl)
	Genre(s):	Alt. Country/Americana/Country Rock
	Label:	Sketchbook
	Price:	£9.99
	Availability:	Sold out / currently unavailable. Sorry!

4
...according to our Maggie on 30 November 2006.

Then I had MICAH P HINSON and his new album The Opera Circuit which was a follow up to his much lauded debut 'The Goblet of Fire' .. no I mean 'The gospel of Progress'. He's got so many friends like Joanna Newsom and Smog, Richard Hawley and nearly as many instruments as he gets his American campfire sounding album into power drive. Not as impressive when he's being melancholy but a very good Americana album.

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What their label says...

The eleven songs that make up 'Micah P. Hinson and the Opera Circuit' are the real deal - a document of friends “shooting the shit” on dusty summer evenings while creating the most beautiful and heart-felt music. This method of recording creates a truly intimate and warm listen, from the sounds of crickets in the long grass on the opening front-porch lullaby ‘Seems Almost Impossible’ (reminiscent of the in-your-lap intimacy of Michelle Shocked’s The Texas Campfire Tapes) to the surface hiss on prairie-ballad, ‘She Don’t Own Me’ and the painfully yearning ‘Drift off to Sleep’ (“when you sleep, what do you see / A million stars to wish upon, or just me?”), while the heavier, full-band songs on the album, such as ‘Letter to Huntsville’ and the epic beast, ‘You’re Only Lonely’, sound as if they are straight out of an intense basement jam session. Perhaps the highlight of the album, though, is the beautiful piano-led, closing death-ballad, ‘Don’t Leave Me Now’ (“found the word digress, and made it a home”). While the album is layered with instrumentation, there is sense of space that allows Micah’s beautifully cracked yet warm vocal and matured songwriting to shine through with a real presence. It should be noted that this astonishing talent is still only 24 years of age. 'Micah P. Hinson and The Opera Circuit' maybe a little rougher around the edges than it predecessor, 'The Gospel of Progress', but its heart pumps much stronger and more honest this time around.