Dax slows things down on "Lonely Dirt Road", releasing a track that will certainly cut through the incessant scrolling of nearly every young person's phone. This track punches as a vulnerability spat in your ear. Initially meant to be car rides to process his thoughts. In forming long, meditative drives, this record captures the metamorphosis with a tremulous nakedness and an almost poetical delineation. Lonely Dirt Road isn't flashy, and that's the point. These words serve as a reminder that healing is not always found in full rooms or the loudest conversations.
Instead of overdoing the message with high production style, Dax rides in by himself on a beat. The soft delivery and careful lyrics provide room to breathe and take it all in. Grainy, but each line feels true, like they were scrawled on the dashboard of a dusty truck with the windows down and a storm cloud burning up in the distance. It is not just a track, but a confession, with the growl of an engine, a sunrise remedy meeting the open road.
Dax does not pretend to have the answers; he lets you in on his process. And, in so doing, he makes anyone who has ever felt stretched thin or anxious or alone just a little less invisible. It is not a polished highway, but rather a dirt path that closely resembles the journey of mental health, crooked and bumpy, yet peaceful and oddly familiar. Other times, it is one mile at a time, the world behind you in the rearview and nothing but sky ahead of you.
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