Gatefold Packaging
Includes lyric "story book" built into package
All-analog recording, mixing, and mastering
Audio Quality: 4.75/5
Song Quality: 4.75/5
Packaging: 4.75/5
I recently watched a movie called "Great World of Sound", which is a very interesting and wholly depressing look at our corrupt music industry. The movie follows the story of a music lover who takes a job as a record producer, thinking it will be a great way to help discover and promote new talent.
Instead, he finds himself working for a company that exploits the dreams of aspiring artists, good and bad alike. As he gradually gets closer to the breaking point, hating himself more and more with every artist they "sign" (aka steal money from), he finally encounters a young woman who stands before him and his partner and sings an a cappella
performance of Joanna Newsom's "Clam, Crab, Cockle, Cowrie" (now famous for being in this weirdo bank commercial). Now, I don't know if it was just because I knew this song and was completely blown away by it's appearance in the film, or if the filmmaker just did a fantastic job of putting us in the same emotional state as our increasingly depressed protagonist, or if it's the absolute beauty of the song and it's performance, or perhaps a combination of all of those things that led to me practically sobbing in my chair during the scene. It was absolutely moving. I won't spoil for you what the result in the film is, but it caused me to practically sprint to the turntable with my Joanna Newsom records. Though I do recommend seeing the film to experience this in proper context (and because it's a pretty damn good movie), I found a link to an MP3 of the performance from the movie right here.Some time in the near future, I'll review Joanna's first album The Milk-Eyed Mender, which contains the multi-aforementioned track. For now, we're going to discuss her sophmore effort, an album called Ys. It's just five songs long, with the average length of each song at about 10 minutes... far different from her previous effort, containing twelve relatively concise tracks. This might seem too daunting of a listen, but even the longest track, the near-17 minute long "Only Skin" is so masterfully composed and arranged that it flies by without ever seeming like a chore. With a degree in classical composition, her song arrangements don't fit into the traditional pop paradigm. Rather, they have all sorts of themes that develop and recur from start to finish, not to mention Joanna's signature lyrics, which are mostly mostly old-fashioned parables, soaked in imagery and filled with words and phrases like "dolorous," "diluvian," and "hydrocephalitic listlessness." This album features Ms. Newsom backed up by epic string arrangements, arranged by Van Dyke Parks, a legendary composer most famous for collaborating with Brian Wilson on the "SMiLE" album. Joanna Newsom's choice to work with him was wonderfully inspired, and his arrangements perfectly compliment her harp performances. Oh... have I not yet mentioned that the harp is her instrument of choice? Whoops! Anyway, the orchestral arrangements are unique, unconventional, and play an integral part in what makes this record so special. It's hard for me to discuss what makes one song better than another, because each of these tracks has so much to offer from start to finish, but one track definitely worth noting is track 3, "Sawdust & Diamonds." It's the only song on this record that features Joanna alone with her harp, and it's an absolutely virtuoso instrumental performance coupled with haunting lyrics and melody. It's absolutely captivating for it's entire 9 minutes, 56 seconds.
The sound on this record is very nice, and though it's not advertised anywhere within the packaging, it is an all-analog product (a quick Google search can find multiple sources that back up this claim). Apparently Joanna fought hard for this, and I'm so grateful she got her way, because this is a record that was definitely meant to be heard on vinyl. Her harp and vocal performance sit right up front, with the sound of her fingers on the strings and the (occasionally) subtle squeaks of her vocal wonderfully clear and detailed. When the orchestra is introduced, they are able to fill the sonic spectrum effortlessly while staying just slightly behind Ms. Newsom. With this three-dimensional quality, you can shut your eyes and visualize Joanna and her harp front and center, with the orchestra situated behind her, spread out across the entire studio. In a few instances, another instrument will step forward and sound as if they're playing right next to Joanna, such as the banjo that appears towards the end of "Emily," highlighting the depth and imaging that this record contains. When I sat down to re-play to this record the other day for this review, it was such a captivating listen that not only did 55-minutes fly by impossibly fast, but even having to stand and flip the record involved pulling myself out of whatever sort of hypnosis this record induces. The quality of this record, both in sound and song quality, is like a musical palate cleanser, and is highly recommended.
The packaging here is really perfect. It's a gatefold set with two 180-gram LPs included. Opening up the package reveals a storybook built into the set, which includes lyrics and illustrations you can read through as you listen to the record (a lovely compliment to the listening process). The set feels perfectly quaint and antiquated for the music it contains. No download and no CD here, which is a shame, but the record sounds nice enough that I can understand not wanting to encourage people to listen to it any other way.
I'm gonna wrap this up with a Joanna Newsom quote I found, which is her describing the way her then-boyfriend Bill would listen to music: ö
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