The Album Review Club - Week #195 (page 1310) - A New World Record - ELO

Say what you want about this album, it certainly generates discussion, I am still 6 pages behind! The last couple albums I had to fish out affa page 3 to comment on.

Most of it seems to be on dinner party music. I often get tasked with dinnder party music choices, being the somewhat connoisseur that I am (snarf). Then I put on gems, and cunts almost always without fail get it turned down. Used to annoy me, but since I met Bimbo, I have been telling myself it is a compliment.
 
FogBlueInSanFran said:
As usual a very fine review, about which I find points of agreement and disagreement.

Whatever one thinks of it on the whole, I am convinced there is one truly great song on this record.
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One truly great song is one more than most albums. I had to try hard to justify why I like the whole despite disliking most of the parts. I don't think I was ultimately successful but that's ok because art is sometimes a vibes medium.

I'm struggling to guess what you think is the truly great song. I feel like the big hits will be too obvious for you and there is nothing that has the tempo you seem to complain is missing in other stuff. I'm going to guess Mary Jane
 
FogBlueInSanFran said:
Tina Weymouth of Talking Heads is in the top 20, but point taken.

I'd say that in my most-liked artists list, a very high proportion (relative to many fellows of my dotage) are female. But of the ten records I've nominated to date, only three are female artists or bands with women (Chappel Roan, Breeders and X) -- and they are my three bottom-ranked picks by the assembled masses.

Was going to nominate some pointless British new wave ear candy pap next time up but may move to something more X-chromosome-forward.
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Mate, Kate Bush only made it to mid table. That's how bad this bunch are ;-)
 
Coatigan said:
Say what you want about this album, it certainly generates discussion, I am still 6 pages behind! The last couple albums I had to fish out affa page 3 to comment on.

Most of it seems to be on dinner party music. I often get tasked with dinnder party music choices, being the somewhat connoisseur that I am (snarf). Then I put on gems, and cunts almost always without fail get it turned down. Used to annoy me, but since I met Bimbo, I have been telling myself it is a compliment.
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Wait -- you MET Bimbo? I always assumed he was a mythical creature -- like a figment of Mark E. Smith's imagination, something like that.
 
mrbelfry said:
Jagged Little Pill by Alanis Nadine Morissette is an album that every logical bone in my body hates but which I'm giving a 9. Whatever criticism you want to throw its way will most likely be met with whole hearted agreement from me with the possible exception that it is trite - I'm open to being persuaded though. This is a pop record with all that trite implies.

The production is quintessentially 90's so I get the Friends comparison - both are products very firmly of its time. The only instrument making anything close to a good sound is the occasional acoustic guitar everything else sounds overly compressed and weak. The playing of said instruments is trite. The bass and guitar on You Oughta Know are particularly egregious examples. I note from Wikipedia that this was provided by Flea and Dave Navarro when they were both playing with the Red Hot Chilli Peppers. I can get behind an argument that Flea is a talented bass player but he's one i find largely unlikeable. His bass line on this is over played as if he's above the material, which he probably is, but it's a Morissette album so have some respect. I did find his bassline less annoying in the remix at the end of the album.

The drums have that awful 90's quasi dance r&b shuffle on large portions and like my criticism of the Embrace album the hands in the air big moments feel unearned musically. They just slap you with little warning or build up but not in an unexpected or surprising way. AND it is kind of trite - in All I Really Want when Morissette sings "why are you petrified of silence; here can you handle this?" and the tracks stops for a second is the most obvious move she could make in this moment. It's also hard to argue that her affectations are annoying and sometimes overpower the music.

BUT this is a great album. Even the much maligned Ironic forces me to yell "it's like rayyyyiaaayyyne on your wedding day" - it's almost a pavlovian response. It bypasses every cynical, snarky idea of what I think music should be and electrifies the little part of my brain that lights up and goes straight to sing a long. Morissette's annoying vocal affectations are numerous but well placed and effective to me for conveying the emotion of the line. She has a couple of variations to keep things fresh. The first couple of lines of the second verse of Perfect are pretty nice before she completely destroys the band. They certainly remind me of Maria McKee's Life is Sweet album (which i seem to keep mentioning recently) but they are less banshee.

Highlight of the album for me is Forgiven which I think serves as a good touchpoint for what I'm responding positively to. I feel like I've spent a month of nominations asking for stuff to be less subtle and more obvious. Well Jagged Little Pill delivers on this and in particular Forgiven. It's refreshingly upfront and obvious and Forgiven nails that post grunge rock thing perfectly - i feel like it's the song where the band almost keep up. The acoustic guitar solo lines are very on brand and nicely placed in the mix to catch your attention as you try and hear the line clearly. Wake Up is also a song that the band mainly delivers on - the bass almost goes into Epic by Faith No More territory. But what the band lack is more than compensated for by the vocal performance and delivery including all the affectations for me. It's delivered with such a boldness and so unapologetically that it totally pulls me in despite my best intentions.

My logical, trying to be cool rational brain, hates this. The chimp part of my brain really enjoys how Morissette varies her delivery across multiple lines (particularly in All I Really Want) and makes sure everything is in large print for the hard of hearing. I think if you didn't speak English you could understand this album but I actually think some of the writing is pretty good. For instance I like the sweater line already mentioned AND if I'm totally honest and unconcerned by what people would think of me I'd actually say I quite enjoy Ironic. I often have more spoons than I need. It's a song that will often come back to my memory despite not having heard it for years and it is eminently sing-a-longable. I think any disagreement here is a sign of snobbishness. You are not Flea and you are not above the material.

It's not a cool album but it is confident and Morissette is, as far as I can tell at least, concerned mainly with being herself, writing about things that have actually happened to her and not making it to hard for me to hear what's she saying - a line like "I confessed my darkest deeds to an envious man" is nicely balanced conveying something obvious but also with some subtext and depth. It's the opposite of jazz so it's a 9 from me, singing into a hairbrush and wondering if i can justify buying a chorus pedal for my bass.
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I'm so envious of your writing. Thats far better than my review as It captures a great deal of what I feel about the album but was too clumsy to articulate. As a died in the wool 70's rock and prod rock dinosaur I really shouldn't like it but I do. That made nominating it worthwhile and I don't mean the high score.
 
mrbelfry said:
One truly great song is one more than most albums. I had to try hard to justify why I like the whole despite disliking most of the parts. I don't think I was ultimately successful but that's ok because art is sometimes a vibes medium.

I'm struggling to guess what you think is the truly great song. I feel like the big hits will be too obvious for you and there is nothing that has the tempo you seem to complain is missing in other stuff. I'm going to guess Mary Jane
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You will have to read my review, which is going to take a bit to process. One thing you pinned down really well is that this record is one of many contradictions.

I will say this -- and you know it already -- but I am a sucker for a hook, and there are lots of them here, so I'm certainly unlikely to tread down a dark path on the whole.

And yes -- one truly great song is hard enough to come by in this world, so good for her (and -- very importantly -- Glen Ballard).
 
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mancity2012_eamo said:
Ok. Second listen. Alone this time.
You know what’s ironic?

Female singer song writer, lyricist, with decent up tempo, guitar based folk/pop/rock cross genre appeal, is something that is right up my alley.
But……. I’ve walked up that alley a couple of times now, and she’s not there.

I’m trying to concentrate on the lyrics, even of the many songs I recognise, but can’t get past her voice which in itself isn’t bad, but when she goes into that nasal back of the throat safe place on her higher more emotive sections of what is no doubt personal stuff, she loses me.
And there isn’t enough interest in the backing instruments, something to lift you out of the banal. Is that a fault of the production? The backing musicians? I’m not sure, they’re perfectly good I bet. I just don’t get anything out of the ordinary from it.
The whole lot still blends into……. Meh!

I’m trying to target what it is, that’s holding me back here. I should really enjoy this rather than tolerate it.

Isn’t it ironic.
Her voice for me would better suit an all female post punk in your face establishment takedown, loud, couldn’t care less, take it or leave it, thrash fest.
However she prefers to try and deliver a solo female social commentary that I can’t really follow, because I switch off halfway through each song.

Maybe it’s me Sadds!
I see myself as a serious music listener but can’t concentrate through one album.
Isn’t it ironic!
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if you don't like the lyrics or the vocals then the music certainly wouldn't hold your attention mate. I'm not sure what it cost to make but large parts are the author, Ballard and a drum machine. The RHCP contingent only played on a couple of tracks I think. It seems to be an album you either like or have a pretty strong repulsion to. Still, it has produced two great reviews to illustrate each. One from Bimbo and the other from mrbelfry. Each classics of their kind. I might add Mrs S is firmly in the Bimbo camp.
 
Coatigan said:
Do you think (genuine question), artists singing in foreign languages would make little to no difference to your experience of music? I often wonder this, generally, when it comes to lyrics that don't capture.
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threespires said:
My next nomination doesn't sing in English.
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Been listening a lot recently to Natalie Claviar who is Argentinian and doesn't always sing in English. I've no idea what she is singing about therefore but this does give it an exotic and I dare say a somewhat erotic edge. Imaginations can run a little wild.
 
Saddleworth2 said:
I'm so envious of your writing. Thats far better than my review as It captures a great deal of what I feel about the album but was too clumsy to articulate. As a died in the wool 70's rock and prod rock dinosaur I really shouldn't like it but I do. That made nominating it worthwhile and I don't mean the high score.
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You're being too kind and under valuing your own ability. I particularly appreciate your research ability
 
Saddleworth2 said:
Have you listened to much mate? She has written some lovely stuff.
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A few studio records (the early ones), then that long thing here. I just find her stuff wispy and gossamer and a little odd and off-putting -- and not enough hooks. It's not her voice. Maybe it's because I like Laurie Anderson and prefer kitschy avant-garde Americans grounded in technology, beats and humo(u)r.
 
journolud said:
Been listening a lot recently to Natalie Claviar who is Argentinian and doesn't always sing in English. I've no idea what she is singing about therefore but this does give it an exotic and I dare say a somewhat erotic edge. Imaginations can run a little wild.
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You're in Thievery Corporation territory there then? Now wondering how The Richest Man in Babylon would go down as an album nomination.
 
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