A full listen, some 25 years after release, at first sounds flat--too smooth. I think I anticipated a grungier, nostalgic sound from the 90s. Something as jarring and haunting as Harvey's older song 'To Bring You My Love' (soundtrack to Peaky Blinders). But this is limiting to an artist who has spent her career defying easy categorization.
In isolation, re-listens of select songs reveal more. 'This is Love' is affirms the visceral now: "I can't believe life is so complex / when I just want to sit here and watch you undress." 'This Mess We're In' interleaves a chaotic relationship with a NYC cityscape in flux. Thom Yorke joins to croon on opening verse, "Can you hear them? The helicopters?" while Harvey drives the memorable refrain: "The city sun-set over me." 'Horses In My Dreams' is a kind of sound painting, taken at a hypnotic, pounding tempo--"like waves, like the sea" indeed. In a 2023 New Yorker interview, Harvey says that Scottish poet laureate Robert Burns was "one of the few [artists] that could write brilliant songs and brilliant poems." 'Horses in My Dreams' starts to achieve something Burns-like. In that mesmeric repeated line, "I have pulled myself clear," there are horses, the ocean, struggle, and transcendence.
A moment for framing. What's happening when one critiques an album? At the age of 41, I find I'm listening now with curiosity but also an increasingly provincial guardedness and gatekeeping. I'm less generous than when trying, say, new cuisine--though in so many ways music is as universal and as sustaining as food. I'm asking, how does Harvey fit into her time and place? How does she contribute something new? Do her geographies, the oceanscape of Dorset, the cityscapes of London and NYC show up authentically in some way?
In critique (as in art and film and literature), we subject others to our taste, our interrogation, our own history. But while I notice my tendencies to circumscription and snobbery here, PJ Harvey reminds me of the refreshing opposite: the ever-searching, expansive soul. I give this album 4 stars.
What more is there to say about this album that hasn't already been reviewed? An astounding who's who of pop hits; MJ at his most iconic; Quincy Jones's formidable producing power on full display. It's not much for poetry nor philosophical depth, but it's unapologetically not trying to be. (And how about that Scorcese-directed, West-Side-Story-inspired 18-min music video with Wesley Snipes? A whole decade of pop culture distilled.)
For a moment, before the sadness of MJ's downward trajectory--abuse and a stunted adulthood begetting more abuse--it feels wholesome to imagine a time when one could admire this young pop king/genius at his peak.
4 stars.
A nice continuing foray back in time to the 70s. While listening, I was surprised to read that I'm quite near the birthplace of CCR: El Cerrito, just north of Berkeley. (Cosmo's Factory was a warehouse space they practiced in.) How did a couple of Bay Area kids arrive at this Southern 'swamp rock' style--their spiritual home not the Bay but the Bayou?
Growing up in a mostly immigrant community, I knew few folks who listened to music like this (my white friends were mostly listening to grunge). My first associations of CCR are in where I first heard them, pitch-perfect: Forrest Gump. The subsequent associations with Vietnam and the antiwar movement are perhaps what tie things back to their Bay origins.
Here today in rainy Berkeley, on one street, we had coffee at an Arabic cafe, then lunch at a Chez-Panisse-alum's spot whose storefront reads, "No Musk No Bezos No Billionaire Nazis." Then lox, bagel, and pastrami at the packed Jewish delicatessen. CCR playing as the soundtrack of the day didn't quite fit the vibe, but nonetheless evoked many intertwining histories.
On to the 90s. The title track here was apparently written with the Rodney King riots in mind, which generates a web of places and faces. The tensions of 'connected'-ness and disconnect, awareness and ignorance, are obviously no less relevant today: "Get yourself connected... / But if you're minds neglected / Stumble, you might fall."
However, this album feels less about heavy-handed social commentary than fun, funk, and dance. Most songs proceed at a similar rollicking tempo, with the formulaic dance beat dunh-dunh chi, duh-dunh-dunh chi--punctuated by those fantastic bari sax licks. Overall, it's a pleasantly receding vibe; you're at a early 90s dance night at the club or at the roller-skating rink. I enjoyed 'Pressure.'
3 stars.
The first listen-through felt surprising: is this really from the 60s? And what is that relentlessly grinding bass sound? I'm reading it's possibly a contrabass trombone. Love it. Then... flamenco guitar, flutes? So strange, so experimental.
Then, during another listen to 'Track B,' two-and-a-half minutes in, I'm unexpectedly swept up into that build-up. I'm suddenly getting Rachmaninov, circus elephants, a sultry night out in the city, a crazed chase in circles, a closing in, still more fury, frenzy, before being gently guided back down from those heights.
Knocked the socks off!
10 years after 'Kind of Blue,' you feel Davis still breezing past the borders and expectations of his art, nonchalantly as ever. Non-standard instruments are at center and wonderfully warm: electric guitar, electric piano (I especially loved this), and electric organ. Splashes of dissonant chords unsettle the listening experience from becoming too 'easy.' There's much here that still feels fresher than today's ambient electronica.
The title track was more poignant for me--both the slower bookend themes and when the bassist (I think?) finds that groove in the late middle theme. However, the transitions were too abrupt for me: did I read correctly that this was just a copy and paste?
This album does prod me to search for more jazz fusion (Spotify intriguingly suggests 'Japanese Jazz Fusion'--likely influenced very much by Miles) and enjoy in the same way that I did today: winding down the evening, drink in hand, rain outside--and staring blankly at emails before looking up Davis's life on my phone. Solid day.
Couldn't stand the lead's voice, though they clearly had a distinct style. Grating, unpleasant, and it was terrible putting this on after a long day. Maybe you just need to be in a very specific listening mood.
