but in this case they agreed with Dr Jimmy...

go suck on an elf twat.


(where i come from, that means "i love you despite your horrific lapses of judgment, take my daughter")

I don't doubt she's saying what she's trying to say quite well, just what she's trying to say comes across as something that'd appeal to 10 year olds to me.

Meet me at the hill mr cheetah
The sunlight bounces off the grass
I can stare into your soul from here
Roll around
Roll around
And we will cherish being as one
Like the birds in the treetops guided together by sirens

And shit of that ilk.

Sure, I can buy that, but her recurring bit about the meteor/meteorite in "Emily" is fantastic and shows not only a good deal of intelligence - she's invoking a whole Saussurean sign/signified linguistic code in a single stanza - but also a strong handle on the beauty of the english language. I'm not one who would defend the album w/o any reservations, and I don't think her lyrics are unimpeachable by any means, but she does have some fantastic bits. (Obviously, in addition to the fantastic bits that all the fanboys seem to be creaming over - personally, I think she's funny looking. Then again, I've never seen her live.)

The meteorite bit was alright, she sure is passionate about them. I really don't think knowledge and a handle of the beauty of the English language is important to making great music, though. It's important for poetry but when it comes to music I'd take Appetite for destruction over this every time, personally.

It doesn't really strike me as mature poetry anyway. I guess at the end of the day it comes down to whether you think calling something childlike is a compliment or not.

This is my favorite album of the year.

FROM ILM


ON POINT

I've tried reading that board a few times but always end up feeling bad for the people that post.

pretty dumb comment. i really don't see how milk-eyed mender is a straight-forward singer-songwriter album minus weird vocals.

i personally don't give a shit about the lyrics; aside from the long song lengths, i don't get why ys getting this knee-jerk reaction from some people.. maybe it's the indie hype. whatever, the songs on ys contain some of the most engaging and beautiful melodies i've heard all year.

The P-fork blurb on Metacritic sums it up best:





And I am squarely in camp one.

Camp one. But they forgot the people that think she's a twatty milk-maid elfwhore.

If memory serves, falling and laughing and Rian from Drag City are totally twins.

her lyrics are pretty. this, i will admit. but i'd rather read her lyrics than listen to her sing them. with every breath she draws, i cringe in anticipation of her next awful shrill to begin the next stanza. it's piercing.....and annoying.

sounds like if that clairvoyant chick from Poltergeist put out a record.

Speakin' of the 'fork, Ryan Gillespie (Under The Radar) recently asked about her elf deal and Joanna had a slamfest:
___
UTR: On style and persona. From the Renaissance portrait painting that adorns the cover of the new album to the elf boots, you have a distinct style that permeates your music, both within the actual songs and in the packaging of you as an artist. That is, Kelefa Sanneh of The New York Times called your songs “weird antiques, rescued from some extraordinary attic” and your aesthetic persona seems to match that spot-on. I suppose what I am really trying to find out in the above is how aware are you of your own persona? Is it conscious effort to construct an image, a persona, or is this just more or less who you would be with-or-without a professional recording contract?

Newsom: What elf boots? No, seriously, a lot of things get written about my clothes that ain't true. Like, I just played keyboards with my boyfriend’s band, in Austin, and afterwards Pitchfork reviewed the show and said something like, I don't know, I was wearing my “trademark renaissance sleeves” or something. I was just wearing some vintage dress from the 30s, I guess it had voluminous sleeves or something, but, I don't know, 'twarent remotely renaissancey.

Anyway, that's neither here nor there. But it bugs me because I'm really into clothes and design and so forth but definitely not into, like, “costuming” or constructing a persona through clothing. There's a silhouette and style I favor, in the way that most girls come to favor a silhouette and style, and I've favored it for years, and it does sometimes involve some volume in the sleeves and a belted waist, but it also often involves blue jeans and shitkickers. I'm sorry to say this, but, in my opinion, music writers—most of whom are dudes—often don't seem qualified to make sweeping statements about someone's style; it comes off clumsy and ill-informed, since most of these dudes don't really spend much time thinking about girls' clothing or paying attention to what girls are wearing on the street. I'm not saying they should think about that stuff but it's annoying to hear some people make sartorial calls with the same suggestion of authority with which they might analyze your music.
___
Ut oh, she's right. P4k, consult me next time for fashion editing. ;)

Good lord, the way that woman speaks... It's enough to make me weak in the knees.

Yes, but the way she speaks . . . like fingernails on the blackboard.

First impressions: it's ok, but would be a lot better if the songs were a lot shorter, had more structure and had less orchestration.

So, in other words, she should have made an entirely different album and you would have been happy?

Yes. I like what I've heard from the first one.

Although, I think if any of those things were done it would be somewhat better.

This is a really deep and challenging record. I think if you're in a meditative mood, listening to this with some good headphones - it's quite a journey. But it's not something to jam to in your car, that's for sure. I haven't decided if it's great or just good, but I can say I haven't heard anything else like it all year.

Also, as others have noted, that's some production team: Van Dyke Parks, Albini & O'Rourke.

I, for one, am glad someone has decided to do something other than spoon-feed us little radio-packaged pop-sized bits of music, something different for a change. These tracks feel more like movements than songs. I have decided Emily is possibly one of the most beautiful things I've ever listened to. I've listened to it the most, so I'll have to wait to give the others some time before I weigh in.

Fucking sold out in DC!!!

Damn it.

It's a grower, for sure. I like what I hear so far, but have only listened a couple of times. I appreciate the softness of the sounds and the great variation in texture-- within one song, sentence, phrase, instrument, or motif. There is great care taken to each note and expression in every song, and I can only imagine it will help the record to bear more fruit with repeated listens over many weeks/months, maybe even years.

Anyone else out there think she sounds like Blossom Dearie singing "less pretty"?

Just caught up with this. The freak-folk tag scared me off for a while, but it really doesn't fall into that camp at all, especially with all the orchestration. I'm surprised I haven't seen more Bjork comparisons, especially Vespertine-era Bjork (what with the harp and all).

Anyway, I'm really digging this. It really came out of nowhere for me, and I always love to hear good music that doesn't really sound like much else out there. Lyrics suck, but who cares

fixed

if she wasn't so cute, this album would not be getting such good reviews. and that's not a critique on her songwriting ability, but moreso on the undersexed male critics reviewing it

looks more like fiona apple

This is misguided and completely incorrect.

Number one - she's not cute. Number two - aren't we past assuming females that get good reviews are only getting so because of their looks?

I don't know wtf that is, but it's pretty funny.

The majority of umbrellatimes' posts on this board are hypotheses very telling of his adolescence.

Girls be sleeping their way to the top

i think it's funny how quickly people dismiss my comment as sexist --as if I'm saying she's not good because she's a woman or attractive, when in actuality I think she's OK , but it's the reaction to her album, honestly perpetuated by some serious fan boys that irks me. Male critics generally are straight, grew up rather dorky and she embodies a lot of their ren fair fantasies, deliberate or not. (ladies chill out I know she appeals to you, but you'll be hard pressed to find a 10/10 review from a female reviewer)...Just check out some of the bylines for reviews, declaring her the genius of the decade, which honestly she isn't. Talented, yes. Different, sort of. Revolutionary? no. Calling me adolescent , while marginally humorous , doesn't really address what I'm saying . It's the easy way out, which is generally speaking , the route most of the critics are taking with this album. It'd be nice to see someone call out the string arrangements as overbearing, and tacked on, and the lyrics at time "adolescent", which they are. but no, saint joanna is impenetrable and incable of wrong doing, ESPECIALLY when the song are *gasp* over six minutes!!! she MUST be artist of the millenium. The hyperbolic nonsense surrounding this album is more a reflection of how easily people are impressed and unedcuated in other areas of music aside from indie rock/pop, including the reviewers which act as though they'd never heard anything as ambitious or lofty before in their
entire lives.

The semi unanimous praise surrounding this album is borderline insulting to the doezens of artists outside the trendy/indie rock genre that create music like this regularly. It's a shame everyone is too star stuck/in love to realize this.

ps. some girl, I thought we'd called a truce. Your response to me, is really much more infantile that anything I'm trying to get across

See, now it sounds like your making an argument that because she makes music that is a little different from the norm, that people overrate her. I think this is a lot more viable. I like this album a lot. Nowhere near my album of the year.

". . . what she plucks and sings in her little-girl-lost warble never seems entirely integrated with the hovering orchestral parts that sound like bleed-over from a symphony rehearsal in the room next door."

http://www.nowtoronto.com/issues/2006-11-1...c_feature12.php

well mattdrufke, I think it's a combination of people acting like what she's doing has never been before, combined with the fact that she's very cute and fashionable to like right now.

My point earlier was, if someone on a no name indie, who wasn't attractive, older, and without any buzz had released the exact same album, that people might be able to put aside their fanatacism and actually REVIEW the album.

I agree, but it still would probably get great reviews for its "originality", "inventiveness", "sophistication", "daring", etc. That's often worth more than quality songwriting.

I'm giving it my first real run through, and it's pleasant, but I'm not willing to oogle over it yet.

What if you're someone like me, who loved her first album before ever seeing a picture of her, and then heard her follow-up, and loved it just as much?

I love that when people don't jump on a bandwagon, it's always SO OBVIOUS that people are overrating the artist. It's so obvious that every single good review she's gotten has absolutely nothing to do with people liking the album. Duh.

Quick observation: Joanna Newsom is this year's Antony and the Johnsons. Same sorts of split opinions on the voice (unique/annoying), music (pretty/pretentious), lyrics (intricate/ridiculous), and overall album (masterpiece/piece of shit)

ummm---I'm sorry if I don't take your response seriously, given that your message "tag" or whatever you call it is a picture of joanna and her lyrics.

I'm not saying there aren't REAL fans of her. tons of them for sure, but I don't think the universal praise (yes aside from toronto's NOW weekly) would be so glowing, had this come from a different BIO

So it seems like this album has spawned the only two reactions that it possibly could have: “This is a masterpiece”, and “This is some sort of disingenuous schtick”.

I don’t understand how anyone listening to this album can take it as anything but genuine. I mean, she can’t really be trying to market herself as the “cute renaissance fair harpist” because, uh… I’ve been an American long enough to know that ‘rennaissance fair harpist’ isn’t exactly a big target market in the music industry.

And I really hate using the whole renaissance thing as a point of reference. Like just because she happens to play this instrument that we tend to think of as antiquated, she must be playing old world music. When, in fact, she just fell in love with this instrument, which happens to be her (fascinating) medium for putting her (brilliant) musical and lyrical ideas to record. Really, Ys is about as modern as I can imagine a record being, just in the sense that it stretches music beyond conventionality. Along with Animal Collective and TV on the Radio, Newsom seems to be one of the few artists in the ‘indie scene’ that is genuinely pushing music forward.

I read a great quote from Newsome that I won’t track down because I’m really lazy, but it was (almost word for word): “I thought for so long and worked so hard on the lyrics for Ys that I feel like I could sit down with anyone and argue for my use of each individual word on this album.”

Now, even if you (inexplicably) think these lyrics are shit, any appreciator of music has to have some degree of respect for an artist who can genuinely say that.

She has also explained that everything on the album is autobiographical which, I think, makes it impossible to label these lyrics as ‘disingenous’, because autobiographical poetry is never disingenuous. It can suck. It usually sucks. Most artists who dabble in the autobiographical tend to be crap lyricists.

But -

we could stand for a century
starin'
with our heads cocked
in the broad daylight at this thing
joy
landlocked
in bodies that don't keep
dumbstruck with the sweetness of being
till we don't be

- is, um, what’s the exact opposite of crap?

Point is, it's my album of the year so far.

I haven't heard this yet but I love Van Dyke Parks arrangements...somehow that he was involved with this eluded me. So i'm gonna have to pick this up today just based on that.

I find it rather moronic the implications that the good reviews have anything to do with this girls looks. I mean seriously come on. Pitchfork gave the 30 year anniversary reissue of horses a 9.4 and Patti Smith looks like some kinda horse faced dog shit.

If you genuinely believe they are the only 3 or the pioneers, you aren't listening to enough music in the "indie scene"

"message 'tag'"?

Welcome to the internet.



Good one. Except I was sorta middle ground on Antony.

I don't think everyone is in the hate it or love it equation. I personally think it's a solid album but don't really get where the AOTY hype is coming from for it because it doesn't stand out to me as remarkable. Except lyrically different but then I hate the lyrics.



Strikes me as grade school poetry, but whatever, I guess.

Also if this and Animal Collective is the direction the genre is moving in then I probably need to jump off. Things don't need to be pretencious to be good.

TVOTR album is great, though.

I certainly didn't mean to imply that there are only 3 artists that are pushing the envelope. These three were just the ones that immediately spring to mind. I'm thinking here of artists that, when someone who is unfamiliar asks you 'what genre is that?' you say 'uh...' and really have to think about it because they don't just slip neatly into a genre. Toss in Destroyer and Liars to this group. I would love to hear other bands that people feel fit into this category.

I would say right now that the poster boy for the 'indie-scene' is probably Sufjan Stevens, who I find to be very enjoyable but find a bit disingenous... almost like he's more wrapped up in the research and the process of creating these opuses rather than tapping into something true.

And then the whole Indie-Rock scene I think has fallen off since the days when Built to Spill and (the artist formally known as) Modest Mouse were carrying the torch. I like The Arcade Fire as much as the next dude (and Wolf Parade, and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah) but I feel like part of the appeal of this sort of stuff is the familiarity of it.

It's easy to make fun of that top '95-'04 SOMB 250 albums list, but remember hearing OK Computer and Kid A for the first time? It was sort of like, "oh so this is what music can sound like". I feel like, while there have been a slew of bands that are really good at what they do (The Strokes may be the best example of this), they're not really doing anything for Music (you know, with a capital 'M', in the broader sense), whereas albums like 'Feels'/'Sung Tongs' and 'Ys' and 'Return to Cookie Mountain' (to get back to the reasons why I initially singled these three artists out) feel fresh... almost put you off your guard the first time you hear them and force you to sort of recontextualize the way in which you view music.

[quote]we could stand for a century
starin'
with our heads cocked
in the broad daylight at this thing
joy
landlocked
in bodies that don't keep
dumbstruck with the sweetness of being
till we don't be

- is, um, what’s the exact opposite of crap?
[/quote]

Strikes me as grade school poetry, but whatever, I guess.

[/quote]

Yeah come to think of it, yesterday I was talking to this 10 year old and he was all like "check out this poem I wrote", and I was like "alright"... and you know what?

He waxed eloquently on the fleeting nature of joy and life and the unfathomable gift of existence. It was the weirdest fucking thing, 'cause I figured his poem would be about, I dunno, humpback whales or some shit. But nope. He laid down some real meaning of life shit. Smart ass grade schooler.

I suppose, assuming you're not in grade school, you might offer us some more poignant insights on this particular aspect of our existence? You know, so we can see what real lyricism looks like.

People don't wax lyrical over stuff I write, I don't need to defend it because noone is calling me a lyrical genius for writing some stuff about a monkey and a bear.

And an overlong and wordy way of saying it's nice to be alive really. 10 is a bit young to be writing it vocab wise though, say high school, my Englishness means I get confused with what age you guys go to what schools.

Joy, landlocked in bodies that don't keep is still far more annoying than good for me, though.

Obviously I was over the top to suggest that you spout out some lyrics. Rather than that, it would be interesting to see what you think are particularly good lyrics. From anyone. Choices are limitless. I'm just curious to know what someone who doesn't appreciate imagery like,

'there is a rusty light on the pines tonight
sun pouring wine, lord, or marrow
down into the bones of the birches
and the spires of the churches
jutting out from the shadows'

considers to be good lyrics.

By your logic, the above sucks because she just could have said, "there's some trees and buildings and its sunny". Um, but that would have sucked. I think the purpose of poetry is to take those everyday, relatable feelings like 'its great to be alive' and express them in a way that brings them to life, evokes emotion or images that its difficult to grasp from rote statements like 'its great to be alive', or 'its sunny outside'.