Beth Orton - Central Reservation
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Beth OrtonEdition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 1999-03-09
Music Label: Arista
Soundtracks:
- Stolen Car
- Sweetest Decline
- Couldn't Cause Me Harm
- So Much More
- Pass In Time
- Central Reservation (Original Version)
- Stars All Seem To Weep
- Love Like Laughter
- Blood Red River
- Devil Song
- Feel To Believe
- Central Reservation (The Then Again Version)
Free Music Notes for Central Reservation
Free Music Review: Shadow of a Doubt
Hit: 4 Stars
Right now, early in my listening to Central Reservation (took me eight years, but finally there), it feels like a 5 star work. But I'm not sure it will be that eight months from now after I've spent a lot of time with it. It may be one of those CDs that grabs at first and then slowly or rapidly loses its grip, e.g. -- for me -- almost anything by the alt country group Son Volt.
Time, as it always does, will tell.
Meanwhile, things I like a lot about Central Reservation: Beth Orton's quirky voice, melancholy, flinty, little girl-like but a bit grating all at once. Like, to wander to another distant corner of the female singer-songwriter universe, Mary Gauthier, Orton's distinctive vocals are a perfect match for her frequently off kilter lyrics. And that's the second big thing to like about this CD -- those lyrics, not so much taken as a whole, but in the occasional sudden line or two that make you sit up and say, "Hey, I never thought of it that way, but that's RIGHT." Examples: in Stolen Car, in singing of the enduring energy of a love thought gone, "your fingers like fuses." Or, in Couldn't Cause Me Harm, on a sometimes scary relationship, "I can feel your heart/especially when it's on the roof of my mouth." Or, on Love Like Laughter, the opening line that captures what good music can always do, "Some of the worst wrongs get righted on three chords."
What I don't like about Central Reservation is that these good things happen in a dozen acoustical songs, including two takes of the title cut (the second is better), whose arrangements are often almost indistinguishable from one another, varied only by a slightly more uptempo beat, a drum set here and there, a tambourine shake. Orton's lyrics reward careful listening, but the problem for me -- why in eight months this may be 4 stars rather than 5-- is that the music doesn't invite the listener into those lyrics; at its worst, it's lulling to the point of drowsiness. It also doesn't help that half the songs go on for more than five minutes. A "Concrete Sky" or two, dropped into this mix, would have done wonders.
Best cuts: Stolen Car, Couldn't Cause Me Harm, Pass in Time, Feel to Believe.
Central Reservation Poster
There's no way to offer a shortcut description of what Beth Orton sounds like. There are so many musical styles pulsing through Central Reservation--jazz, folk, pop, rock, and dance--that the album could easily have ended up an empty exercise in genre-hopping. Instead, it's a bracing example of mongrel music at its best as Orton carves out a new musical vocabulary with deep roots in familiar sounds. --Keith MoererIs Beth Orton the folkie Beck? Or is Beck an Orton with beats? Since both graze from genre to genre like goats feasting on whatever strikes their fancy, drawing parallels is tempting...and perhaps pointless. After all, both artists were born in 1970 and emerged at a time when musical categorization became an exercise in futility. English thrush Orton's third album--like her critically hailed debut and the Best Bit EP--prompts one to flash on an ever-swelling range of influences. Since she's blessed with the rich, warm voice of a true pop singer, it's easy to imagine her sharing space on some out-of-time radio playlist with Dusty Springfield (listen to the elegant, string-laden "Sweetest Decline"), except Orton's music draws on '90s trip-hop elements as well the jazzy folk of Tim Buckley and vet Terry Callier (reprising his Best Bit cameo). Orchestration, upright bass, vibes, and Orton's own resolute guitar give long, languid tracks such as "So Much More" and "Pass in Time" an Astral Weeks-like feel. All those touchstones and no fewer than six producers might imply that Central Reservation is something of a mishmash. In truth, Orton's overriding vision is all that's needed to create cohesion. --Steven Stolder
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