I got my income tax refund last
week but it was already spent, paying property taxes and buying a new suit.
Being an adult is not nearly the glamorous enterprise I imagined it would be as
a teenager.
Fortunately, I still have enough money
to frivolously add CDs to my collection!
Disc 1018 is…Mental Illness
Artist: Aimee
Mann
Year of Release: 2016
What’s up with the Cover? When I uploaded this album, the
interwebs decided to assign it the digital cover art for the alt country band
Old 97s 2017 release “Graveyard Whistling.” At least it got the text and the
songs right. I don’t own “Graveyard Whistling.” I did give it an honest listen
and liked it, but it fell just short of shelf-worthy.
The actual cover is a creepy painting that I have
decided to call “Giant Chicken in the Enchanted Forest.” If you were to
encounter this chicken in the woods I think it would silently walk up to you,
look down with that benevolent half smile on its face, then lean over and bite
your head off. Not everything in the Enchanted Forest is your friend, folks.
How I Came To Know It: I have been an Aimee Mann fan for
years. She is one of those artists I trust enough to buy whenever she puts out
a new album. That’s what happened here.
How It Stacks Up: I have eight Aimee Mann Albums. Of those
eight, “Mental Illness” isn’t the best but it holds its own. I’ll put it fourth
bumping “Fuck Smilers” and “Charmer” down one spot each.
Ratings: 3 stars but almost 4
“Mental
Illness” is an apt title for this record, which explores doubt, confusion and
the poor decisions people make when they are emotionally or mentally
unbalanced. Aimee Mann does a great job of capturing the rabbit hole of
disconnected imagery of characters trying – and often failing – to get
themselves straightened out.
At times
I’m not even sure what Mann is singing about, such as on the album’s first and
best song, “Goose Snow Cone”. This
feels like a song about someone trying to keep it together when friends visit, desperate
to keep up appearances. Whether the narrator is depressed, insane or just
suffering dementia isn’t clear. It is a testament to Mann’s songwriting talent
that she can weave this into a lovely trilling melody that unfurls all that doubt
and confusion like a flower.
All the songs
are carefully constructed, starting with zingers like this one from “You Never Loved Me”:
“Boy when you go you go
Three thousand miles just so I’ll
know
You never loved me”
Ending
on sad and abrupt notes, often with the melody unresolved and restless. This is
music that makes you want to give yourself a reassuring hug, partly because you’re
not sure you can trust someone else to do it right, and partly because its
introspective secrets call for solitary comforts.
Mann’s
voice has lost nothing over the years, and still knows how to flow around a
melody, often punctuating a line with an early high note, with plenty of room
for her to gently descend back down the other side or trill a little, as the
song demands. She’s not a powerhouse singer, but she has a sweet and melancholy
tone, and writes to her strengths.
Her
previous album (2012’s “Charmer”) has a lot more up tempo and rock elements,
but “Mental Illness” opts for a softer approach, with a focus on lightly played
piano, and flourishes of cello and violin. “Charmer” is the easier album to
love out of the gate, but “Mental Illness” is a slow burn, digging deeper into
my soul on each listen.
The
melodic structures are very similar to what Mann has done before, but since
that has always been beautiful it’s no great crime. She employs them more
subtly than previously and so while the album isn’t immediately catchy, it is worth
the time invested.
The last
song is “Poor Judge” which combines all
the best elements of the record; piano driven, with swells of violin that are romantic
and tragic in equal measure. Mann’s vocals are low in her register and honest
as she admits “My heart is a poor
judge/and it harbours an old grudge” as she lattices in broken relationship
imagery like “A dream of a car with the
brake lines cut” and “leather books
and surplus government chairs.” Sumptuous and coldly bureaucratic all at
once; you can’t tell if the narrator is singing about her therapist or her
lover – maybe both.
“Mental
Illness” is one of those records that will require a bit of time to open up to
you but you’ll be glad you gave it the chance. While the characters she sings
about are not sure of themselves, Mann remains very much in confident and total
control of her craft.
Best
tracks: Goose
Snow Cone, You Never Loved Me, Patient Zero, Good For Me, Poor Judge
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