CD Odyssey Disc 1648: Martha Wainwright

Exactly 200 reviews from the last time I rolled a Martha Wainwright album, we roll her again! In case you’re wondering, that’s a little more than two years later.

In case you have a more immediate observation along the lines of “holy crap, is this the third review of the month and we’re only six days in?” the answer is yes. Not coincidentally, I am on vacation. Amazing how much more time I have to listen to music and write about it when my time is my own.

Disc 1648 is…Self-Titled

Artist: Martha Wainwright

Year of Release: 2005

What’s up with the Cover?  A Giant Head so Giant it has become a Giant Face. In your Face, Giant Martha Face!

How I Came To Know It: A few jobs ago I got to know a person working next to me named Anna and we struck up many a conversation about music. Martha Wainwright was one of her recommendations. Thanks, Anna!

How It Stacks Up: I have two Martha Wainwright albums (she has released six but I only like two of them – this one and 2008’s “I Know You’re Married But I Have Feelings Too” (reviewed at Disc 1448). Of the two, her self-titled album is easily the better record, so #1.

Rating: 4 stars but almost 5

I sincerely hope that Martha Wainwright achieved something akin to therapy writing and recording the songs on her 2005 self-titled album, because if not…yeesh. She goes deep here, taking you on a journey of heartache, desire and emotional complexity that left my ears happy and my heart a little exhausted.

I am not an unconditional Martha Wainwright fan. Wainwright has a natural warble to her vocals and has never met a melody she didn’t want to mess with, even if just a little bit. She has a tendency to sing all around a song’s structure that can feel like modern interpretative dance. When it lands, it takes your breath away. When it doesn’t land, it quickly dissolves into a hot mess. On her debut record she makes all the right choices in a way that she never recreates quite so well again.

Wainwright’s writing style if like freestyle poetry which is not always the best match to pop music sensibilities. Good thing she doesn’t give a fig about pop music sensibilities. She bends them to her will throwing progressions at you that follow a twisted ley line underneath and through pop, jazz, R&B and half a dozen other things I’m too musically illiterate to define.

The topics are all emotionally intense, with a clarity of expression that can be uncomfortably direct. “Ball & Chain” starts with the excitement of raw sexual desire:

“Bend me over the back of the car seat
Take me down to easy street”

Which then transforms into hurt and betrayal:

“Yeah her t**** were higher than mine
With a waist that is sugar-fine
I heard she could read and write too
And she's getting a degree in f***ing you”

The whole record has the stain of betrayal, with Wainwright doubling down on the topic with “Bloody Mother F***king ***hole”, which is up there with Marianne Faithfull’s “Why D’ya Do It?”, Alanis Morissette’s “You Oughta Know” and Lucinda Williams’ “Those Three Days” as the nastiest break up song ever written. Wainwright’s entry in the genre opens with…

“Poetry has no place for a heart that's a whore” 

…and gets progressively rawer and meaner from there. In fact, despite the tight race, I’ve gotta give Wainwright the gold medal on this one. Whoever this song was written for has probably already spontaneously combusted from the rage released in their direction. What is so great about this song is that it is not just angry, it is also filled with that mix of self-loathing and brokenness that comes when things fall apart, turned both outward and inward in a widening gyre of vitriol that burns like an acid bath on both narrator and audience alike. How she was able to sing it with the evocative mix of grief and fury and not be reduced to cinders herself is a minor miracle.

The line between creating great art and collapsing under the weight of self-serving ambition can be razor thin. But on this record Wainwright consistently walks on the right side of that line. When she does cuts herself on it, every wound is deliberate and purposeful. The result is bloody but brilliant.

Best tracks: Far Away, Factory, These Flowers, Ball & Chain, Don’t Forget, When the Day is Short, Bloody Mother F***ing ***hole, Whither Must I Wander

CD Odyssey Disc 1448: Martha Wainwright

For the second straight review we delve into the wonders of 2008. As we do so, however, we depart the world of heavy metal.

Disc 1448 is…. I Know You’re Married, But I’ve Got Feelings Too

Artist: Martha Wainwright

Year of Release: 2008

What’s up with the Cover?  Martha looks absolutely amazing here, but would it kill the couch to show a little leg? That floor-length skirt does nothing for its curves.

You might also ask why Martha is laying so awkwardly, but couches this size are just awkward for reclining; you just can’t stretch out. And if she were to do so, those heels could easily tear the fabric.

How I Came To Know It: I was introduced by a coworker in my last job, Anna, who played me one of her songs. While it wasn’t on this album, it did cause me to dig through Martha Wainwright’s back catalogue. “I Know…etc.” is one of the albums I discovered in that process.

How It Stacks Up: I have two Martha Wainwright records. Of the two, I must put “I Know You’re Married But I’ve Got Feelings Too” in at #2. Depending on whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist, this means it earns a silver medal or comes in last.

Ratings: 3 stars

“There are days when the cage
Doesn’t seem to open very wide at all.”

These lines open the record and along with the song’s title (“Bleeding All Over You” you know early on you are in for an emotional rollercoaster ride. This is a collection of mournful dirges dressed up as pop songs that sometimes work, and sometimes don’t.

At their best they are heartbreaking birdsongs warbling with a sad beauty. At their worst, they’re caterwauls of despair – a tomcat yowling at the moon while dodging old shoes thrown by neighbours trying to get some sleep. Either way, you can’t deny they come from a place of passion.

Wainwright has a great voice, and she explores every corner of it. On “You Cheated Me” she sings in a soft and breathy whisper, and on “Tower Song” she climbs high up in her head voice and pulses with a light ululation. Across a whole album it’s an acquired taste, and on my first listen I found it hard to settle in, sometimes all the verbal gymnastics even getting in the way of Martha’s natural talent for storytelling. No matter how artistic or creative it may be, if there is too much going on vocally, at some point it just upstages a good tale.

When Wainwright plays it straight, as she does on “You Cheated Me” and “Comin’ Tonight” she’s at her best, blending smooth production with innovative melodies and phrasing. She has a gift for climbing up high in the middle of a progression, and then tumbling down the other side.

At other times, such as on “Tower Song” it feels more like an interpretive dance gone wrong. Overly creative, trying to evoke emotional resonance with strangeness, but ending up with only the latter. There’s a Patti Smith vibe when she goes for this, but it doesn’t land that same gut-punch that makes Smith’s songs so powerful and affecting.

Subject-wise Wainwright gets right to the heart of nasty and unhealthy relationships. “You Cheated Me” and “In the Middle of the Night” both masterfully twine hints of violence and emotional damage around a core of sensual longing that ably captures the confusion of the characters that inhabit them.

The biggest problem on the record is that Wainwright tends to over-sing songs that don’t need the extra push to make their point.  The record is also a bit long, and the latter third tends to drag a little with a lot of overlong atmospheric numbers. That said, I should note that even the songs I don’t like, do what they do deliberately, and do it well. It just isn’t always my cup of tea.

The record ends with a solid up-tempo cover of the Eurythmics “Love is a Stranger” which has an unexpected country/rockabilly vibe that channels a bit of early Springsteen. Crossed with Wainwright’s unique vocal styles, makes for a catchy mix.

In the end, this record is not unlike its cover: a mix of awkward and sexy. I never got comfortable enough to love the experience, but it had some good moments.

Best tracks: Bleeding All Over You, You Cheated Me, Comin’ Tonight, In the Middle of the Night