Minton Sparks is a great storyteller. Humanity with humidity all told humorously with humility. Sin Sick is just what the doctor ordered. --John Prine

Sin Sick Soul 3:52 Play Clip
(piano, Steve Conn)
Vickie Pickle's Momma 2:01 Play Clip
(guitar, John Jackson)
Peeping Tom 2:52 (guitar John Jackson)
Ghosted 3:06 Play Clip
(guitar, John Jackson)
Gypsy 4:09 (accordion, Steve Conn, violin, Peter Hyrka)
Aunt Shines Face Lift 1:51 Play Clip
(guitar, John Jackson)
White Lightning 3:48 (mandolin, Chris Thile*)
Back of the Bus 3:49 Play Clip
(guitar, John Jackson, bass, Byron House)
Hell's Kitchen 3:31 (guitar, John Jackson)
South of Descent 2:36 (piano, Steve Conn)
Cluck, Cackle, Peck 1:52 (guitar, John Jackson)
Dark Socks 3:01 (guitar, John Jackson)
Eastern Star 4:16 (guitar, John Jackson)

Engineered and mixed by: Gary Paczosa Recorded at: Minutiae Sound Studio, House of David, and Omni Studio in Nashville, TN
Produced by: Minton Sparks and Gary Paczosa
Assistant engineering, Brandon "Heber" Bell
Mastered by Don and Eric at Independent Mastering
Photography, Mary Beth Cysewski
Graphic design by the wonderful Christa Schoenbrodt
*Chris Thile appears courtesy of Sugar Hill Records, a Welk Music Group Company.

Writer Dorothy Allison says, "Minton Sparks sounds like my momma, my Aunt Dot, my Aunt Grace and even a bit like my Uncle Jack-only better and wilder and heartbreakingly more powerful. If I could have heard poetry like this as a girl, I wouldn't have had to waste all those years thinking we were dumb as dirt."

1. Fill Her Up Play Clip
2. Sorrow Knows This Dress Play Clip
3. Bird In A Cage
4. When You Coming Home, Girl Play Clip
5. Ambulance Chasers
6. Her Purse Play Clip
7. Dance Caller at the Marco Polo Park Play Clip
8. Killin' Time
9. I Thought He Might Kill Her
10. Momma Flies A Car
11. Epiphany
12. Put Her To Rest

Produced by Steve Conn
Recorded in Nashville, Tennessee by:
Miles Wilkinson and Steve Conn at The Connderosa
Nathan Smith at Mainframe Studios
Cliff Goldmacher at Cliff's Walk-In Closet
Chad Hailey and Chris Scherbak at Seventeen Grand
Mixing and Mastering by Jim DeMain at Yes, Master
Cover painting by the amazing artist Mary Carter
Graphic Design by Christa Schoenbordt

Performance poet Minton Sparks breaks new ground with this evocative collection of poetry and music. The clear Tennessee/Arkansas landscape painted in this memoir reveals a girl's tender take on her rural southern family. Middlin' Sisters conveys the heat of a Tennessee porch outside the city limits on a Summer afternoon, where formal feminism hasn't yet framed the house of living and loving.

1. Line Up
2. Trella^(1)s Trash
3. Mississippi Moonshine
4. Grace on the 4th
5. Words of Wisdom
6. Rich Man, Poor Man, Timber Man, Drunk
7. Speak to Me, Tennessee
8. Mourning the Missionaries
9. Primary Resistance
10. Pilgrimage to Aunt Virginia's
11. If Only, Aunt Sye
12. John 3:16 Guest Preacher at Prayer Meeting

Tracked, Recorded, Engineered and Mastered by Nathan Smith at Mainframe, Nashville, TN
Produced by Marcus Hummon
Mandolin, Banjo, guitar, dobro, etc. Darryl Scott
Banjo and slide guitar: Rob Jackson