Posts Tagged: a lily for the spectre

2008 / 4 stars / june is for women / rachael yamagata / reviews — No Comments
21
Jun 09

Elephants…Teeth Sinking Into Heart (2008) by Rachael Yamagata

rachael yamagata elephants teeth sinking into heart

Rachael Yamagata
Elephants… Teeth Sinking Into Heart
2008, Warner Bros.
pop, acoustic, blues rock
4½

In an interesting turn of events, Rachael Yamagata’s sophomore album is split into two distinctive style and records. The first, Elephants, is similar to her debut Happenstance in that it is filled with dark, moody ballads, while the second, Teeth Sinking Into Heart, has a harder rock sound and a faster tempo. Yamagata’s gritty contralto of course shines poignantly in Elephants, but the true surprise is that her voice is actually better suited to the harder Teeth. Yamagata could have easily pacified her fans and created new listeners had she simply released Elephants, but Teeth… was a brilliant move on her part. Each song on the second record is just as carefully written, constructed, and sung as the songs in the first, but the second record reveals a nearly unbridled Yamagata; she almost sounds like Pink in “Faster.” Teeth is so good, I wish it were longer – but I’ll have to content myself with waiting for her third album.

“Accident,” “Duet,” “Faster.”
myspace, last.fm
Stephanie Dosen’s A Lily For the Spectre, Catherine Feeny’s Hurricane Glass

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2008 / 4 stars / audrey / reviews — No Comments
24
Mar 09

The Fierce and the Longing (2008) by Audrey

The Fierce and the Longing by Audrey

Audrey
The Fierce and the Longing
2008, A Tenderversion Recording
indie pop
4

I’m not very familiar with shoe-gaze, but I’m pretty sure that Audrey is as close as I’m going to get to it. This [country] band is all-female and all suave femininity. Interestingly, all four women in the band share vocal duty equally, which is quite rare.

Their smoky voices and coffeeshop-esque post grunge is refreshing at first but gets old quickly. Why? Because there is nothing happy about this album, lyrically or sonically. It’s so moody that it’s difficult to get through this in one sitting, let alone on multiple repeats. But its beautiful depression makes it all worth it by the end.

“Big Ships,” “Horses are Honest,” “Northern Lights.”
myspace, FREE DOWNLOAD @ last.fm
Stephanie Dosen’s A Lily For The Spectre, Thrice’s The Alchemy Index, Vol. 3

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2007 / 4 stars / reviews / stephanie dosen — No Comments
20
May 08

A Lily For The Spectre (2007) by Stephanie Dosen

Genre: dream pop, indie pop
Rating:
Check Out: “Lakes of Canada,” “This Joy,” “Owl In The Dark,” and “Vinalhaven Harbor.”
myspace

Hailing from Wisconsin and currently based in Nashville, Stephanie Dosen credits her beginning in music on spare time spent in her family’s peacock farm. While that explanation would have adequately explained her playful and haunting independent debut Ghosts, Mice, And Vagabonds, her Bella Union debut A Lily For The Spectre is less playful and more temperate.

Like other Bella Union artists, this album features delicate and straight-forward lyrics couched in Dosen’s hauntingly sweet voice. Comparing Ghosts and A Lily shows what benefits a producer and a contract can bring; the lyrics and arrangements are less cluttered and more down-to-earth here than in Ghosts. This simplicity allows Dosen’s voice to really shine through, and it does – to the point where you’re unlikely to ever forget her.

The only detractors from this album is the sometimes cloying quality of these songs. There’s only so much Dosen can do with her voice until you become convinced that your CD is skipping, the songs sound that similar. And despite all the hype Sufjan Stevens gets, I still think Dosen’s cover of The Innocence Mission’s “Lakes of Canada” is the best. Overall, it’s a beautiful debut, and I fully expect her popularity to increase once her music shows up in the soundtrack to a major motion picture.

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