Joanna Newsom - Ys
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Music CD Cover
Artist: Joanna NewsomEdition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2006-11-14
Music Label: Drag City
Soundtracks:
- Emily
- Monkey & Bear
- Sawdust & Diamonds
- Only Skin
- Cosmia
Free Music Notes for Ys
Free Music Review: A Historial Artifact : The Worlds' Most Lyrically Accomplished Album
Hit: 5 Stars
Joanna Newsom's little-known "Ys" is one of those rare animals - brilliantly reviewed by art critics, yet criminally underperforming in the marketplace. Indeed, few people even know of this albums' existence, which is a pity because it contains the most beautiful words ever put to paper, or ever put to record. If your knowledge of 'female singer songwriters' is limited to Tori Amos, Fiona Apple or Kate Bush, how unfortunate! Its artists such as Joanna Newsom who make the afore-mentioned artists seem also primitive in terms of lyricism, as she elevates writing and poetry to another entirely new artform.
Joanna Newsoms' voice is an acquired taste. The first time I heard this record (only 5 songs, but they last upto 15 minutes each!) I was irritated and annoyed at her extremely high-pitched and almost childish voice. Its easy to be put off by this, but think of her as the female Tom Waits, only at the other end of the vocal spectrum. Her voice isn't especially melodious, but what she lacks in that department, she makes up for with her quaint, steeped-in-Celtic-mysticism lyrics, and brilliant enunciation (she also has an interesting soprano, which she reveals towards the end of the record, on Track 4)
However, this is an album that is more about the words than the actual music. There is simply no verse-chorus-verse, and instead what we have are text-heavy page after page of complicated imagery and poetry set to that most old-fashioned and wondrous instrument - the harp. Joanna is the only living performer on Earth who uses the ancient harp as her prime instrument of choice - it features prominently on every track. In this aspect, she is close to Kate Price ("The Isle of Dreaming") who used Uillean Pipes on almost every track on that 2000 album.
Joanna's lyrics are at once incomprehensible, yet each song tells a tale - the most breathtaking is the opener, "Emily", which bends and turns with a melody that is both stark and mesmerising. The 17 minute closer is another stunner. There is no way that anyone could possibly remember the words to the songs (no line is repeated, save for one little phrase on Track 1) - and altogether, the number of words sung is massive. The last track alone runs for nine full pages of text.
But its the words that give this album its' charm. Its not for nothing that my review title calls this the most lyrically accomplished of all time. Here are a few samples:
From "Emily":
"come on home, the poppies are all grown knee-deep by now
blossoms all have fallen, and the pollen ruins the plow
peonies nod in the breeze and while they wetly bow, with
hydrocephalitic listlessness ants mop up-a their brow
and everything with wings is restless, aimless, drunk and dour
the butterflies and birds collide at hot, ungodly hours
and my clay-colored motherlessness rangily reclines
- come on home, now! all my bones are dolorous with vines"
I especially love how she uses adjectives at almost every turn. Some prime lines from "Monkey and Bear" reveal that when Joanna wants things to rhyme, she can do it, but with the most interesting results. This track is certainly the most 'accessible' of the entire lot, but seriously, the words will transport you to another place, but only if you are quite ready for that sort of escapism. Otherwise it will only strike you as unnecessarily pretentious and bothersome:
"first the outside-legs of the bear
up and fell down, in the water, like knobby garters
then the outside-arms of the bear
fell off, as easy as if sloughed from boiled tomatoes
low'red in a genteel curtsy
bear shed the mantle of her diluvian shoulders;
and, with a sigh, she allowed the burden of belly
to drop like an apronfull of boulders
if you could hold up her threadbare
coat to the light where it's worn translucent in places
you'd see spots where almost every night of the year
Bear had been mending suspending that baseness
now her coat drags through the water
bagging, with a life's-worth of hunger, limitless minnows;
in the magnetic embrace
balletic and glacial of Bear's insatiable shadow"
You can tell that the artist is capable of brilliant imagery and is a master at conjuring up a magical world that is not yet in existence. On "Only Skin", which for many reasons is the albums' greatest track (and not only because it runs for 17 long minutes), the last three minutes elevate the entire album into a standalone masterpiece - as it breaks free of all genre, all convention, and enters a galaxy all its' own. How did she do it?
It will take a while for you to get into "Ys". Buy it, play it at least four times (all the way through), and let it reveal its magic to you. It isn't an easy listen the first time. You might wonder why certain songs drag on, and whether anything really makes any sense. But trust this reviewer, the lyrics are key to the songs. One cannot possibly comprehend the gloriousness of this album without a lyrics sheet in front of them, and this is definitely the way to appreciate this masterwork.
So will Joanna Newsom's "Ys" redefine musical history? For me, it has. For ages, I've waited for an album to defy musical convention and break out of the word 'genre'. And like an old, lost artifact, comes "Ys". It certainly is unique - yes, but its also from another planet - almost alien in its' weird, bizarre approach to the musical form, and the strange, almost twisted and otherworldly lyrics make this a project that is certainly 'once in a lifetime'. However, I will state that you need an extremely open mind to enjoy a work such as this, as it requires you to invest in it, at least a few hours a day for a while, before you 'get it'.
Five Stars. Clearly one of the greatest existing musical recordings on our planet today.
Ys Poster
Comes in a special packaging with a booklet.Joanna Newsom's voice--a piercing flutter that's pitched somewhere between Bj?rk and a hand brake--is an acquired taste. But to the uninitiated, it's not nearly as impenetrable as her cosmic poetry or, for that matter, baroque music. The 24-year-old Californian harpist's second album is a five-track concept piece loosely based on its namesake, the mythological drowned city of the Bretons. We say "loosely" because she leaves plenty of room for digressions on meteoroids and birds flying into windows. While Ys was recorded by minimalist Steve Albini (Nirvana, PJ Harvey), it includes lush string arrangements by Van Dyke Parks (Brian Wilson) and the final mix was done by sonic experimentalist Jim O'Rourke (Sonic Youth, Tortoise). The result is an album that sounds unlike anything else. And despite containing spectacularly beguiling songs that stretch out past 15 minutes, every second seems to drip with magic. You certainly don't get that with Ashlee Simpson. --Aidin Vaziri
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