Spent the last little while revisiting the music of St. Vincent after only giving it a cursory glance in past. With early reports of the style of her new album being quite compelling I wanted to prepare myself for that release.
Her first two albums, Marry Me and Actor clearly show some promise and a desire to do whatever she wants. The wide range of styles and influences in these albums was clearly a sign of things to come. #StVincent
Third album, Strange Mercy expands on her talent for experimentation. Actor and Marry Me showed some punky jazz, folk rock and a little Brit pop but those didn’t quite come together. Strange Mercy goes much bigger than that and works. It’s soundtracking a moment in her life.
Love This Giant, her collaboration with Talking Heads’s David Byrne is the turning point in her musical career to this point. It’s difficult to say this is a St. Vincent album because it is dominated by Byrne but working with someone like Byrne perhaps expanded her horizons.
This is an album I was not expecting. It’s self titled and appropriately so. This is St. Vincent showing what she can do on the grandest scale. A massive album in length and sound with some sonic consistency.
Albums of this length rarely fill their running time but this one feels like it could give even more. We’re not talking power ballads here but we are talking a powerful performer. #StVincent
Hopefully not at the apex of her career but when you are able to release three versions of your 6th album it is more than a sign that you are going places. MASSEDUCTION shows St. Vincent’s habit of subverting expectations. It’s original release is packed with 80s electronica pop.
That original release is a quality listen but when you follow it up with a piano and voice only version you can call expectations totally subverted. The piano only version of MASSEDUCTION is her best work yet and is meant to be listened to and heard.
The 3rd version is a two hour long set of electronic remixes. It sounds great but two hours is a chore. Not something you will do every day.
Daddy’s Home expands not on experimentation but on instrumentation and sees St. Vincent’s voice as the most prominent instrument. Plenty of influences from 70s funk to cabaret but it all works. This is the first time so have heard the steel guitar on a St. Vincent album.
Daddy’s Home is an album for you to hear, not one that is just meant to soundtrack your afternoon of housework. #StVincent
Eyes have been opened to the talent of St. Vincent. The influences from Prince to Madonna and 70s funk to 80s rock and Brit pop is astounding. More astounding is her ability to consistently bring all those influences together into a quality package which is only St. Vincent.
2022 has been a great year for new music. There would be somewhere around 20 to 25 albums that I could happily put on now and into the future and be totally entertained. It’s been hard to narrow it down to my favourites but over the next 7 days I will share a bunch of them.
7. Don’t Know What You’re In Until You’re Out by @Glad_eee
Might be a bit of recency bias here but I have had Gladie on almost constantly for a while now. Don’t Know What You’re Until You’re Out showcases their fast paced indie rock and quirky vocals.
The vocal may be a little unfashionable but they suit the narrative and the vibe perfectly. It was released on the verge of the US winter but here in Australia it could be your prefect summer soundtrack.
Handmaid’s Tale season 4 has gone off the rails from a story telling perspective. I am all for suspending disbelief when I am watching sci-fi but not when I am watching something that should still apply the laws of common sense.
Or at least common Gilead sense. There is so much going on that simply would not occur in Gilead or in any society that behaves the way Gilead does. June’s own actions also defy belief considering what she has been through over the last few years.
It’s always been the case that June should have been on the wall in season 1 and that is true but the fact that she is not on the wall early in season 4 along with Lawrence is beyond belief.
It was the release of #TheUnravelling that has led me to dive headlong into @drivebytruckers. I’ve listened to them plenty before but have never taken the time necessary to really absorb them.
My first introduction to them was through hearing @JasonIsbell perform some of the contributions he made to the band but it was 2016’s American Band that I started to learn of the long term driving force behind then. That being the creativity, talent and conscience of
@pattersonhood and Mike Cooley. There is a coarseness to their voices that through the compassion and conscience of their songwriting becomes soothing, comforting and remarkably convincing. It’s especially powerful in the bands more recent albums but it has always been there.