Buck Meek The Mirror
Buck Meek's The Mirror positions the songwriter's intimate country-rock instincts against a wash of textural electronics and confessional lyricism, and across professional reviews critics largely agree it succeeds. With a 79.7/100 consensus score compiled from 10 reviews, the record frequently points listeners toward standout songs that balance tenderness and edge, including “Gasoline”, “Demon”, “Soul Feeling”, “Can I Mend It?” and “Pretty Flowers”.
Critics consistently praise the album's marriage of acoustic roots and synth ornamentation - meditative, warm production that frames themes of memory, mirroring, and inner demons. Reviewers highlight “Gasoline” as an igniting folk-rock centerpiece, “Demon” as a trippy interrogation of haunting imagery, and “Can I Mend It?” and “Soul Feeling” as the record's emotional fulcrums. Across the reviews, professional critics note Meek's confessional songwriting and collaborative lineage, with subtle electronic touches serving as adornment rather than reinvention of his troubadour identity.
While praise is predominant, several critics offer a measured perspective: the synth experiments and production flourishes sometimes risk softening the album's traditional grit, and a few reviews prefer the more old-world Americana moments where Meek's voice and acoustic arrangements cut clearest. Still, the critical consensus suggests The Mirror is a confident, rewarding collection - a textured, reflective entry in Buck Meek's catalog that delivers memorable songs and enough sonic risk to keep repeated listens revealing new details.
Critics' Top Tracks
The standout songs that made critics take notice
Demon
6 mentions
"the noise helps illustrate tunefully delivers lyrics like "But my demon's still breathing/I thought that I had killed it/But it's crawling in the weeds again."— AllMusic
Soul Feeling
7 mentions
"electric guitars run wild on ‘Soul Feeling’ and ‘Worms,’ both invoking a Southern rock tune"— Far Out Magazine
Pretty Flowers
8 mentions
"On the second track, "Pretty Flowers", Meek realizes, "The more I get to know you, the less I know of love"— Beats Per Minute
On the following track, "Can I Mend It?", Meek worries, "Can I make it whole? Now that you’ve seen the dark side of my soul?
Track Ratings
How critics rated each track, relative to this album (0-100). Only tracks that made critics feel something are rated.
Gasoline
Pretty Flowers
Can I Mend It?
Ring Of Fire
Demon
God Knows Why
Heart In The Mirror
Worms
Soul Feeling
Deja Vu
Outta Body
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What Critics Are Saying
Deep insights from 10 critics who reviewed this album
Critic's Take
Buck Meek has quietly built a wonderful discography and on The Mirror he leans into collaboration, inviting close contributors to shape these warm, soulful songs. The reviewer's tone savours the album's easy-going energy while singling out the bookends as the best tracks - “Gasoline” and “Outta Body” - for their scale and vibrancy. “Gasoline” is praised as a resplendent folk-rock beauty that hints at Neutral Milk Hotel, while “Outta Body” is hailed as the most vibrant number, its propulsive rhythms and subtle electronics popping with colour. The result is a gorgeous, easy-to-love collection that rewards attention.
Key Points
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The best song is “Outta Body” for its vibrant, propulsive rhythms and colorful electronic embellishments.
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The album’s core strengths are warm collaboration and easy-going, soulful folk-rock songwriting.
Themes
Critic's Take
On Buck Meek’s The Mirror the best songs reveal themselves as quiet epics, notably “Demon”, “Can I Mend It?” and “Pretty Flowers”. The reviewer's voice delights in Meek’s newfound separation from Big Thief, praising how “Demon” personifies what haunts him while “Can I Mend It?” offers an uplifting counterpoint. The Mirror is described as cohesive yet comprised of autonomous moments, making these tracks the standout entries and the best songs on The Mirror. The result is Meek at his most confident and inventive, songs meant to be carried through your life.
Key Points
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“Demon” is the best song because it vividly personifies Meek's haunting past and anchors the album's emotional weight.
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The album's core strength is its confident, autonomous songs that recontextualize Buck Meek as a singular, inventive songwriter.
Themes
KL
Critic's Take
Buck Meek’s The Mirror is at once tender and muscular, and the review makes clear its best songs are those that marry heart and craft - notably “Demon”, “Soul Feeling” and “Outta Body”. The writer praises “Demon” as a standout homage that reveals Meek’s collaborative lineage, and celebrates “Soul Feeling” as a full-blooded Southern rocker with hymn-like verses. There is also admiration for the closing “Outta Body”, whose melody and satisfying resolution evoke James Taylor or Paul Simon while deepening the album’s themes of mirroring. The narrative voice remains appreciative and observant, noting production touches and lyrical openings that reward repeated listens.
Key Points
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The best song, "Demon", is best for its emotional homage, lyrical depth, and characteristic wiry guitar lines.
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The album’s core strengths are its blend of tradition and experimentation, collaborative spirit, and songwriting that rewards repeated listens.
Themes
Critic's Take
Buck Meek keeps his warm, lilting melodies at the center of The Mirror, but it is the textured electronics and plaintive self-scrutiny that make the best songs stand out. The review singles out “Pretty Flowers” for its synthy bell-like tones and brisk drums, and “Demon” as particularly trippy with ominous guitar and staticky effects. Meek's voice and acoustic foundation make songs like “Heart in the Mirror” land emotionally, so queries about the best songs on The Mirror should start with those tracks and his standout production moments. The result is an album where tenderness and distorted sonics collide to spotlight his most affecting performances.
Key Points
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The best song is "Demon" for its trippy production and lyrics where noise amplifies emotional confession.
Themes
Critic's Take
On The Mirror, Buck Meek is at ease with himself, turning self-scrutiny into deceptively affable songs where best tracks like “Demon” and “Heart In The Mirror” stake emotional claims. The record favors candid, country-leaning storytelling - “Gasoline” and “Pretty Flowers” shimmer with new-love detail, while “Soul Feeling” and “Deja Vu” bring late-album surprises. There is a consistent warmth to the production and a sly humour in the lyrics that makes these songs the standouts on the album.
Key Points
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“Demon” is the best song for its raw acknowledgment of inner struggle and memorable lyricism.
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The album’s core strengths are candid songwriting, warm production, and a balance of light humour with existential probing.
Themes
Critic's Take
Buck Meek approaches The Mirror with a quietly inquisitive gaze, and the record’s best songs - most notably “Gasoline” and “Heart in the Mirror” - distill that tension between feeling and language. The review’s sentences savor small, exacting details, noting how “Gasoline” opens with intimate vernacular and gibberish that reads like private code, while “Heart in the Mirror” becomes the quasi-title track that wrestles with love’s backward logic. Meek’s songwriting remains the key focus, even as collaborators and modular synth flourishes broaden the palette and lift mid-album moments such as “Pretty Flowers” into strange, resonant clarity. This is a measured, texturally rich album whose best tracks guide listeners toward the arcane splendor of affection rather than solving it.
Key Points
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The best song, "Gasoline", is best for its intimate lyrical image and fluttering acoustic heartbeat that makes private language audible.
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The album’s core strengths are Meek’s focused songwriting and the subtle textural layers that lend indie-folk songs an esoteric, electronic edge.
Themes
Critic's Take
Buck Meek’s The Mirror homes in on love and self-reckoning, and the best songs on The Mirror - notably “Gasoline” and “Demon” - stitch that narrative together with raw intimacy. The reviewer’s voice lingers on Meek’s crooning slicing through James Krivchenia’s Play-Doh production, making “Gasoline” an igniting single and “Demon” a catchy album-standout that teeters between clarity and dissonance. Other highlights like “God Knows Why” and “Soul Feeling” confront memory and existence with production flourishes that reward repeat listens. This is a record where collaboration and vulnerability create a warm, distinctively Meekian atmosphere.
Key Points
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The best song, "Demon", is the album-standout for its emotional resonance and production that teeters between clarity and dissonance.
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The album’s core strengths are intimate songwriting, collaborative warmth, and inventive production that foregrounds Meek’s distinct voice.
Themes
Critic's Take
Buck Meek frames love as an inscrutable force across The Mirror, and the review singles out songs like “Ring of Fire” and “Gasoline” as the record's clearest illuminations of that theme. The writer's voice lingers on tactile imagery and modest production flourishes, praising how “Gasoline” pairs fluttering acoustic guitar with intimate gibberish, while “Ring of Fire” transposes Cashian heat into a haze-filled folk transformation. The result is an album that does not solve love's mysteries but guides listeners to their existence, with these standout tracks exemplifying Meek's knack for rendering feeling as texture and small revelation.
Key Points
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“Ring Of Fire” is best for its tactile, Cash-referencing transformation and is called a standout moment.
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The album’s core strength is intimate songwriting augmented by subtle electronic textures that render love as texture and haze.
Themes
Critic's Take
In his low-key, observant way Dean Van Nguyen argues that Buck Meek still fares best as a traditional country-rock troubadour on The Mirror, and the review points listeners toward the album’s strongest moments like “Can I Mend It?” and “Soul Feeling”. He notes that the synth touches are subtle adornments rather than reinvention, leaving Meek to shine on mid-tempo laments and whisky-soaked blues rock. The reviewer’s voice is affectionate and precise, privileging the old-world threads in which Meek seems most comfortable. This is a review that answers queries about the best tracks on The Mirror by highlighting songs where Meek’s traditional instincts fuel emotional clarity and musical grit.
Key Points
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The best song, "Can I Mend It?," stands out for its startling, intimate portrayal of culpability and inventive arrangements.
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The album’s core strengths are Meek’s traditional country-rock songwriting and tasteful, subtle synth ornamentation.
Themes
Fa
Critic's Take
Buck Meek approaches The Mirror with a meditative honesty, mining self-reflection and love to land its best songs. The review elevates “Ring of Fire” as the standout, a lullaby that carries Meek's confessionals and musical lineage. Tracks like “Can I Mend It?” and “Demon” probe inner fractures with plainspoken lyricism, while “Pretty Flowers” and “Soul Feeling” show the album's soft-rock and Southern-rock expansions. This is an album where quiet revelation and sturdy hooks make clear which are the best tracks on The Mirror.
Key Points
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‘Ring of Fire’ is best for its lullaby intimacy and being named the standout track by the reviewer.
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The album's core strengths are meditative self-reflection, plainspoken songwriting, and rootsy folk-Americana instrumentation.