Michelle Branch + Jessica Harp = Amazing

After more than a year of waiting, the long-awaited debut album from The Wreckers is finally available.

The Wreckers consists of Michelle Branch, the amazing, widely-known, Grammy-winning singer/songwriter, and Jessica Harp, the equally amazing yet unfortunately not-as-widely-known singer/songwriter of the same vein. In late 2004/early 2005, the two decided to collaborate, and thus, The Wreckers came to be. As The Wreckers, Michelle sheds her pop persona and focuses more on Jess's country stylings, providing a contemporary pop/country mix. Stand Still, Look Pretty is the result.

The album opens with the duo's first single, Leave The Pieces, which is the kind of song you'd hear on a typical modern country radio station. Right away, the music and lyrics prove to the newcomers the amazing talents of Michelle and Jess while giving die-hard fans more of a reason to love them.

Jessica brings The Good Kind, a previously written song of hers, to the plate. This song also appeared on the One Tree Hill soundtrack in early 2005, giving the world their first taste of The Wreckers. The song has changed slightly from the soundtrack cut to the album cut, giving it a bit more country twang than it had previously. While Jess's original version is an in-your-face rock song, The Wreckers have tooled it into a heartbreaking country/pop song in the vein of songs by country artists like the Dixie Chicks, only with more of a pop flavor.

Likewise, Michelle brings one of her songs, Lay Me Down, to the project, which fans have been dying to hear more than a 50-second clip of since the days of Hotel Paper. The finished version on this album is a good example of Michelle's talent with lyrics, as well as the girls' vocal range.

Elsewhere on this album is a beautiful cover of Patty Griffin's One More Girl, an extremely emotional song, which expresses the emotion that Jess and Michelle can convey with their voices.

The title track, Stand Still, Look Pretty, is another of the songs that best captivates the audience with emotion and beautifully-executed lyrics. This is my favorite track off the album and, from my viewpoint at least, it expresses many of Michelle's feelings about her popularity and what's expected of her in the music profession.

The closing track, Crazy People, is a decidedly silly song that can only be described as, well, crazy. Listen closely to the lyrics and you'll see what I mean. The Wreckers' official street team is also named Crazy People, which could be taken to mean that they believe that their fans are just as crazy as they are. Or maybe that's just me.

Filling out the album are Way Back Home, Tennessee, My, Oh My, Hard To Love You, Cigarettes, and Rain. However, these tracks are by no means filler. Each of these songs displays the raw talent of Jessica and Michelle through their music and lyrics. Way Back Home, Tennessee, My, Oh My, and Cigarettes are more traditional country with a modern twang, while Hard To Love You and Rain are a mix of pop and country flavors.

I've been a huge fan of Michelle Branch since Hotel Paper was released in 2003, and I loved her singles from The Spirit Room before I knew it was her singing them. After hearing the announcement of the formation of The Wreckers and seeing them live on the One Tree Hill tour, I was introduced to Jessica Harp's music and became a fan of hers. Now that Stand Still, Look Pretty has hit shelves, and the dynamic duo has started over with a new sound, I've fallen in love with them all over again. This is one album that is hard to remove from your CD player, even if you're not a die-hard uber fan. People out there who don't like country may even have a hard time saying no.