Patty Griffin - Impossible Dream
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Free Music Notes for Impossible Dream
Free Music Review: Patty's outdone herself
Hit: 5 Stars
i had the realization as i sat down with this album that patty griffin will probably be the best songwriter i will hear in my lifetime. she achieves this through the combination of simple lyrics and simple melodies (who would have thought this combination could earn her the status of best songwriter in the world). it's impossible to explain what it is about her. there's the voice, a voice that can laugh and cry (though it cries most of the time) and cut into you like a knife. sometimes she'll sing a phrase and i'll just break down crying. "useless desires," for instance, is a series of phrases that seared me one by one, culminating in "waiting on the train tracks, but the train never comes back ... i'm the last one hanging around." same goes for "florida" - "isn't it hard sometimes, isn't it lonely, how I still hang around here when there's nothing to hold me"(can you tell i'm feeling after college, living at home loneliness). these are the two best tracks, lyrically. the thing about patty, though, is that it doesn't matter if her lyrics are startlingly original. some people could look at "when it don't come easy" and "kite song" and say they were the most trite, cliched lyrics they've ever seen. but she sells them, she makes you love them and hold them close to your heart.
my only regret is that i was heavily exposed to "silver bell" (the unrealesed gem of an experimental record). i might have been married to that version of "top of the world," maybe because it was so different from the dixie chicks version. but this song may be the best i've ever heard: lyrically, musically. this version is one of many. virgin ears would be just as floored as i was listening to silver bell.
do i think she can do better than this record? absolutely. but i hate to compare her records because i find little fault with anything. my only complaint about this one is the first two songs. she shouldn't try to be bonnie raitt and bob dylan when being herself is enough to be the best singer/songwriter alive.
this woman has never let me down. i am indebted to her. i apologize for trying to sing like her. but she has the kind of songs that impact everything you do. if you're a singer songwriter, your voice will naturally lean towards hers, and your melodies, too. she must not be listened to enough because if everyone was listening to her, the music in this world would be much better.
Free Music Review: Blew Out the Light in My Soul...
Hit: 5 Stars
Patty Griffin proves once again that she is a songwriter of formidable powers. I'm a big boy, but freely admit that I wept openly after after first hearing "Forgiveness" off her first album. This album is revelatory in another respect. Anyone who thinks of Patty as a songwriter first and a singer second should pop this CD into their stereo and repent. Her voice is soothing where it suits the song, and a tactical weapon of cataclysmic proportions at all other times.
The premise of such a large voice bellowing out of such a delicate frame beckons comparisons to Edith Piaf. The difference is that Patty's voice is more versatile. She can sing honky-tonk with a swagger (Loves Throws a Line), blues like a hip-cat (Standing), and the meloncholy ballad like nobody's business. "Cold as It Gets" might be her darkest song on record, and when she sings about a "wind that blows as cold as it gets/blew out the light in my soul," she leaves no room for doubt that the candle's out. I heard Patty sing "Top of the World" on public television back in 2000. I wondered why this incredible song hadn't made its way onto an album, and was quite surprised to see it on a Dixie Chicks album. It's a fine cover, but I was pleased to see Patty reclaim this song here. Her performance is superior because of its heightened emotionally intensity.
This album is only slightly blemished by some questionable mixing. Her vocals and the instrumentals are not always properly balanced. The instrumental lead-in on some songs was scarcely perceptible, prompting me to turn up the dial only to risk detonating my speakers once she actually started to sing.
With this album, she has achieved a perfect 5-0 record. There are few artists whose albums can be purchased without the slightest trepidation. Patty is one of the few.
Free Music Review: Impossible Dream is impossibly good
Hit: 5 Stars
There are debates all the time about whether or not Patty Griffin's forays in to the rock world (a la Flaming Red) was wise, but for Patty Griffin purists, "Impossible Dream" is a sophisticated, moving throwback to her roots.
For anyone who does not realize how many people have covered Griffin's songs, her ability to string poetry together with melody is stunning, but nothing can parallel her power and range as a singer. I have all of Griffin's studio CDs as well as live recordings, and I've seen her in concert, and she's truly mind-blowing in every situation.
For me, I almost wish I was hearing her music on vinyl instead of through the more crystalline, flawless medium of digital audio. Something about her folk roots does bump up against the almost-too-clean production values, and there's a part of me that longs for her to crank out another stripped-down solo record like "Living With Ghosts." However, the purity and strength of her signing certainly does shine on CD in a way that might not fully be represented on an LP. She's just almost too good to be captured well in any recorded medium.
Though there are few viable hit-worthy singles on the album, that's not what Patty Griffin lovers require anyway. Instead she plumbs the depths of human longing and suffering, along with interjected morsels about her take on the state of the world. All of it, regardless of the subject, is tinged with some degree of sorrow or pain, which is at the heart of any great folk music and the hard living that accompanied it historically. With "Impossible Dream," Griffin continues her legacy as an indelible folk icon, setting new standards for musicality within a medium often focused more on story. Patty Griffin is the rare embodiment of both virtuosic musical talent and subtle lyrical storytelling.
Free Music Review: What the World Needs Now
Hit: 5 Stars
I can't think of another singer/songwriter who tells such starkly beautiful, utterly simple stories of love, loss, hope or desperation with the economy of words which Patty Griffin calls upon (once again) on her latest collection, "Impossible Dream."
Like all Griffin-penned tunes, the minimal narrative threads of every song here take me on a journey - down late night highways, past childhood playgrounds and familiar backyards - to the innermost reaches of the soul... to the "Top of the World."
Whether a soulful, bluesy beat like "Love Throw a Line," or the gospel shuffling of "Standing," or the see-saw sing-song of "Rowing Song" with it's 'Bacharach-esque' muffled horns, Griffin's ability to devastate me with a whispered phrase or a single urgent note is uncanny.
But something about Patty Griffin also makes me smile. Maybe I just know the world is a better place when I find music that says exactly what I'd hope to say if I were a musical artist instead of a visual one.
With her fifth release, it's getting harder and harder to think of Patty as my own little secret... but then again, I wouldn't be a decent friend if I didn't share her with as many people as I possibly can... or if all of us hopelessly devoted fans didn't wish her the undeniable success she deserves.
Listen to "Impossible Dream"... or "Living with Ghosts," or "Flaming Red," or "1000 Kisses," or "Kiss in Time." See what I mean.
Free Music Review: The dark side of Patty Griffin
Hit: 5 Stars
Patty Griffin is one of those artists who seem to discover songs rather than write them; her music has a magical, eternal quality that is not easy to identify. Is it her arrangements, which combine delicate, understated acoustic tones with a refreshingly tasteful use of electronic and synthesised sounds? Or her lyrics, which mercilessly lay bare our hidden fears and useless desires? Whatever it is, Patty Griffin has created a sound that is entirely her own, and never has this been more beautifully clear than in Impossible Dream. Darker and more inward looking than 1000 Kisses, there is a recurring theme of frustration and inability to find contentment, indicated by the title of both the album and the fifth track, Useless Desires. Lyrically Patty is still on form, with her unique ability to wrap up such simple sentiments with wonderful charm and clarity: "We're just like anyone else/We just want a little bit of sun for ourselves/And a little bit of rain to make it all grow/maybe a minute or two to get lost in the glow of love". Her foray into the blues, as in Love Throw a Line and Standing, should be seen as a sunny spell in this otherwise exquisitely melancholic collection. Highlights are, as ever, the most simple and moving songs, such as Icicles and Kite Song. This album is a celebration of beauty, love and emotion; if any of those things interest you, Impossible Dream won't be leaving your CD player any time soon.