This reimagined set of songs (one from each studio release session, plus the new title track) from over thirty years of song-writing seems like a particularly important album for veteran singer songwriter Mary Chapin Carpenter, who has been releasing albums since 1987. Carpenter states that the key to Sometimes Just the Sky was an interview she read with Patti Smith, who believes that ‘you don’t have to look far or wide, and it doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive or madness in order to find things to soothe you in life or to be happy about’. In a musical sense, this new mindset seems like an extension of the ethos behind 2016’s wonderful The Things that we are Made of, a David Cobb produced album that marked a distinct change in style for Carpenter from her previous Songs From the Movie, which was, like this record, a reinterpretation of old songs. But where that set laid on orchestration and lush backing, Things stripped it all back and let the songs speak for themselves, a brave move that, with assured handling, paid off and resulted in a memorable album. Thankfully, Sometimes Just the Sky also brings in top quality personnel for production and session duties. Although the arrangements here are not as sparse as Things, what producer Ethan Johns has ensured, through the live band recording process (why would you do it any other way with a band album?), is an organic and streamlined hour of music through thirteen songs.

The album was produced by Ethan Johns in the Wood Room. It was engineered by Dom Monks and the assistant engineer was Oli Jacobs.