Everything's a little better in Portland, Oregon, if you believe my boss, a transplant from that misty metro. The air is a little cleaner, the public transportation runs a little faster, the gentry is a little more enlightened, and the music is a notch higher than what the rest of the country is accustomed to. And after hearing the powerful debut album by the Places, a temporary (for now) marriage between local singer/songwriter Amy Annelle and a crew of Portland's finest musicians, I'm inclined to agree. At least, in this case.

Annelle's voice is the dulcimer of Heaven. Wrapping her borderline soprano lovingly around each individual syllable, she sounds not unlike the sweeter side of Liz Phair ("Glory," "Nashville," etc.) at times, especially on songs like "No Mystery" and "Mouth to Mouth." The complementary acoustic and clean-toned electric arrangements hint at the gentle rocking sound of swaying hips. In this sense, The Autopilot Knows You Best feels like a slow dance at a favorite dive; a sensual two-step between lovers with warm bodies and contented hearts. The overall effect is that of having a soothing and skilled pair of fingers massaging your temples.

The album commences with "Own Your Own Home" which has reappeared in my brain day after day, week after week, like an attention-starved poltergeist, since I first listened to Autopilot. Annelle charms with a haunting melody, and slaughters with lines like, "A small thing/ A whole thing/ Little flimsy parody/ What you think you know/ Think you need/ Never was supposed to be like this." The rest of the album hovers at a similar caliber.

"Will Try" stands out stylistically as accomplished meditative, Southern country, but the country of Spanish moss curtains and rockers on wraparound porches, rather than pickup trucks, beef jerky and spittoons. Wisely recorded "live in glorious mono," the song is already so rich that any more gloss would risk ruining it. "The Projectionist" is an understated hymn that turns on the simple-but-wicked lyrical barb, "I couldn't fix you/ If I wanted to." A menagerie of folky instruments permeates the song, as well as the entire disc: accordion, viola, lap steel, organ, triangle, tenor guitar, and piano. Behind them all are some of the most accomplished and experienced musicians in Portland, striving to match up to the high standard set by Annelle's pipes.

Lyrics that have the ability to turn the sterile plastic disc into diary pages abound. "Love Song for a Comet" broadcasts emotion and longing into the stratosphere. The melody aches for you to understand: "So long/ So long since you've gone and oh so far away/ Out in space/ It's all wrong that you could come this far and still have nothing to say."

Elsewhere, snips of '50s documentary voiceover and disembodied samples of Merseybeat add a dreamlike sepiatone tint to the record. And the cover of Syd Barrett's "Late Night" that concludes the journey is touchingly rendered and gently bizarre.

I've never floated through an album before, but listening to The Autopilot Knows You Best, I felt as if I were buoyed on the zephyr of Annelle's ivory-pure voice, passing through the vapor of flawless, narcotic clouds of music, on my way to somewhere else: a cleaner place; a more enlightened place. A place like Portland, Oregon maybe.

-John Dark