Carrie Elkin & Danny Schmidt

For Keeps (Red House)

Separately, Carrie Elkin and Danny Schmidt are among Austin’s most dynamic folkies. Together, they’re now engaged to be married. For Keeps, their first album as a duo, celebrates that relationship but speaks of universal truths, each complementing the other in subtle yet crucial ways. It’s a call-and-response that lends the set a tone of his and hers impressions on life and love. Schmidt’s “Kiss Me Now,” first sung to Elkin at SXSW 2013 as a marriage proposal, shows off his ability to be direct yet sophisticated. Meantime, the gentle sway of “Longing Moves the Ocean” accompanies some of Elkin’s finest romantic poetry. A coterie of enablers pitch in, including Colin Brooks, Chip Dolan, Raina Rose, Paul Curreri, and Devon Sproule, adding a festive nature to For Keeps, a work that convincingly expresses the remarkably positive side of interpersonal relationships.

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This article appears in June 6 • 2014.

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