Pretty Runs Out

1	Pretty Runs Out 3:29
2	Chirmolito 3:11
3	French Jig 3:14
4	Brick Wall 3:50
5	I Don't Want to Be Your Friend 4:17
6	Garden of Eden 4:15
7	What's Wrong with You? 4:24
8	McGee's Medley 4:10
9	Wishing Me Away 4:18
10	Gone 3:10
11	Woulda Coulda Shoulda 3:24
12	Reels: The Gaspé Reel/Sam; S Slammer/Imogen's Ridge 4:21
13	Easy on Your Way Out 3:27

Barnes & Noble

It takes supreme confidence in your abilities to cut a debut album that embraces a barnburning Cajun fiddle instrumental; a moody, Diane Warren-penned pop heartbreaker originally cut by Cyndi Lauper ("I Don't Want to Be Your Friend"); a Zep-influenced heavy rock grinder ("Easy on Your Way Out"); and a stack of original songs. Welcome 16-year-old, Louisiana-born-and-bred wunderkind Amanda Shaw, on whom too much praise cannot be heaped. She writes with a wisdom befitting a more worldly lass, attacks the fiddle with a fluid, historically resonant style (betraying influences ranging from the Cajun legend Denis McGee to Doug Kershaw to Richard Greene to Stuart Duncan), and sings in a husky, pixie-ish voice that is at once innocent and earthy, sort of a cross between Kasey Chambers and Deana Carter. And what songs! The five penned by Shaw herself include a shimmering, stomping swamp-pop confection redolent of Tony Joe White ("Chimolito"); a sputtering, honking, funk ditty, "Brick Wall"; and the penetrating advisory "Pretty Runs Out," which urges, "read beyond the magazine pages / they don't tell you that a supermodel ages / don't you know / that pretty runs out." The last young whippersnapper to emerge with the whole musical package so fully formed, so fluent in the pan-cultural lingo, and so unabashed in revealing the heart was Nickel Creek's Chris Thile. That's heady company to be in, but Shaw gives every indication of following the same adventurous direction that's invigorated Thile's work in and out of Nickel Creek. She's arrived, and she belongs. David McGee

All Music Guide

Only 16 years of age, New Orleans fiddler/songwriter/singer Amanda Shaw makes an impressive debut with Pretty Runs Out, an album that runs a fairly wide gamut of musical styles but never sounds like it comes from anyplace other than her home town. The title track, which opens the album, carries with it a faint whiff of the new wave '80s (there's just a touch of Kate Bush in the melody), and the funky beats and snotty lyrics on "Brick Wall" somehow manage to sound like a French Quarter version of middle-period Talking Heads (with horns and some very greasy guitar). "I Don't Want to Be Your Friend" is a brilliant country-Cajun romantic kiss-off song written by Diane Warren, originally recorded by Cyndi Lauper, and brilliantly performed by Shaw as if it had been written just for her. "French Jig," which is not a jig, is a spare and dry Cajun instrumental with a hint of ska thrown in for extra spice. The album's highlight, though, is a slow-burning song of longing titled "Wishing Me Away"; her double-tracked fiddle solo halfway through is a gem of restrained emotion, and her close-miked vocals are a perfect balance of intimacy and power. Then the album closes with a brilliant Cajun reel set and "Easy on Your Way Out," which sounds for all the world like a parody of pompous 1970s white funk-rock. Not bad for a kid who was born in the early '90s. Highly recommended. Rick Anderson