I am feeling a little tired this
week and looking forward to the weekend.
Disc 1060 is…I Speak Because I Can
Artist: Laura
Marling
Year of Release: 2010
What’s up with the Cover? It’s a bit on the grey side,
although it does evoke Greek statuary a bit, and I like Greek statuary. Nevertheless,
I declare this cover…meh.
How I Came To Know It: I’ve known Laura Marling since I
saw her perform on the Jools Holland show about seven or eight years ago. This
particular album eluded me until earlier this year, when I was reminded of its
existence via the oft-referenced (by me) “Top 100 Indie Folk Albums” list from
Paste Magazine. It came in at #36 on that list, and while I wouldn’t have
ranked it so high seeing it there made me think “Hey, that’s a Laura Marling album I don’t have – I should check it out.”
So I did.
How It Stacks Up: I have four Laura Marling albums and I like
them all to varying degrees. I put this one in third, a hair behind “A Creature
I Don’t Know”.
Ratings: 3 stars
I’ll admit when the dice gods
offered up “I Speak Because I Can” out of my new music section, it wasn’t what
I was hoping for. I had to remind myself that I bought it for a reason and to
give it a chance.
The album is only 36 minutes long,
and over the past couple of days I’ve heard it almost four times through so I
had plenty of time to decide just how I felt. At first I was pleasantly
surprised, by listens two and three I was genuinely impressed and by listen
four I was thinking “solid record, but I’m ready to hear something else.”
Laura Marling is an English contemporary
folk singer with vocals that tend to be a bit flat, but are more than
compensated for by lyrics that are sharp. See what I did there?
Anyway, Marling’s tone has a husky
hint in the low register and surprisingly sweet at the top end, but it isn’t
her vocal prowess that keeps you listening, it’s her songwriting.
Musically these songs are restless
to the point of sometimes being agitated, but never without a point. This is a
record about uncertainty, both internal and external, and Marling’s ability to
explore that shifting emotional ground is what makes her so compelling. She derives
an awkward strength from the journey that she’s not afraid to express, such as
these lines from “Rambling Man”:
“It’s funny that the first chords you come to
Are the minor notes that come to serenade you
And it’s hard to accept yourself
As someone you don’t desire.”
As you would expect from lyrics
like that, Marling is also a thoughtful melody writer and while these songs
aren’t exactly pop hooks, they have an interesting progression and tend to blossom
into something subtly beautiful before they’re done. Marling also knows how to
end the musical concept without resorting to flourishes and fade outs. Lesser
indie folk singers, take note: it can be done.
I was also impressed by Marling’s guitar
work. She plays with a style that fluctuates between classical and busker as
the song and moment demands. It is easy to underestimate guitar in a folk song,
but it would be a mistake here, where it is every bit as much of a star as the
song construction and lyrics.
Production-wise, there are times that
the sound is a bit too round and atmospheric where it called for a more stark
treatment, but overall Marling is restrained in the arrangements, knowing when
to bring in a little banjo or fiddle without making it all fussy in the
process.
The record demands your attention
for maximum enjoyment. All music suffers from being relegated to “background
music” but “I Speak Because I Can” would suffer more than most. That’s a shame,
because when I’m not listening for the purposes of writing a review, I’m often
doing some second activity (playing a game, reading a book) and I expect that
this record won’t get put on as much as it deserves.
Finally, I experienced some annoyance
over the album’s presentation. The only song listing for the CD case is that
hodgepodge on the cover photo above. Fine for when you are reading it off your
digital device, but annoying if you are listening on your home stereo and
having to constantly futz and count across to be sure of the song title. Also,
the lyrics inside are presented in big blocks of hard to read print with no
line breaks. If you’re going to publish the lyrics, at least make it easy for
me to follow along.
At her best, Marling reminds me of
Leonard Cohen or Angel Olsen, which is pretty good company to be keeping. While
this album didn’t live up to the hype of the Paste article, I still am glad I gave
it a chance.
Best
tracks: Rambling
Man, Blackberry Stone, Goodbye England, Hope in the Air, I Speak Because I Can
No comments:
Post a Comment