Ending My Ani DiFranco Experience With An Educated Guess, Another Mediocre Album!

The Good: General musical sound, A couple lyrics.
The Bad: Packaging, Short duration, Indistinctive songs, Stories between songs wear thin.
The Basics: With another disappointing album, Ani DiFranco mumbles through and produces over her own lines on Educated Guess.


As my final dip into the pool of works of Ani DiFranco, I find myself listening to Educated Guess on high replay, one of DiFranco's lesser known or reviewed works. While this was her thirteenth album and one of her studio albums - not to mention one of her more commercial successes (it peaked at 37 on the Billboard 200) - it is remarkably unmemorable and returns DiFranco to a vocal tradition that is less listenable than other works from around the same time. Oddly enough, the album also returns DiFranco to a more folk-rock tradition in the style and format. Still, the album is shorter, illustrating perhaps some cracks in her creative process that fail to be filled by the songs here.

Educated Guess is a combination of whined out songs and mumbled stories that are inaudible at the same levels at which the rest of the album is heard. The work is utterly lacking in discernible lines or melodies that can be carried by those who might care. This continues a troubling trend in DiFranco's works where her instrumentals drown out the vocals and her lyrics are mumbled through in a way that is virtually unlistenable. At least on her early albums, DiFranco had something to say and she made sure her listeners could understand it!

With fourteen tracks, clocking out at 48:15, Educated Guess contains eleven songs and three stories (like the seventeen second opening "Platforms") and the album is definitely the work of Ani DiFranco, who at her worst is talented with many instruments. In addition to writing all fourteen tracks, she performs the lead vocals on each track on the album. As well, this is a creative explosion for Ani DiFranco the musician in that she plays at least five instruments on the album, including acoustic and electric guitars, bass, percussion and the electric piano. She also has her usual control on the production end, where she produced, engineered, and mixed the album. In all of her creative endeavors, one suspects she could have made sure a track list made it onto the album packaging, but no such luck here.

That said, the creative control DiFranco exerts is extensive, but unfortunately does not yield anything in the way of incredible results, unless one enjoys music that is moaned through (the track Educated Guess), presented with annoying nasal vocals ("Origami") or produced such that the instrumentals completely overwhelm the vocals (as she does on her song "You Each Time"). The best thing DiFranco has going for her on the album Educated Guess are her instrumental performances. Unfortunately for her - and the listener - the mix of guitars, bass, electric piano and mild percussion seldom yields a recognizable tune.

Even worse, many of the songs on the album sound alike, lending a boring homogenous quality to the overall album experience. So, for example, "Bodily," "You Each Time" and "Bliss Like This" all begin with vacillating guitar fingerings that sound like the lead-up to a gunfight in an old Western film. Regardless, they all sound like one another and that is problematic, especially when one listens to the album on high replay.

As annoying are the vocals. DiFranco engineers her voice to echo on tracks like "You Each Time" and where her natural voice and the production elements swap sides throughout the album is questionable, leading listeners to ask the question of how good a singer DiFranco is at this point. The argument can be made that it doesn't matter; when one chooses to perform or produce their vocals to sound like they are singing out their nose, the net result is a pretty lousy album and unfortunately, that is what the listener is subjected to on Educated Guess.

I continue to argue, though, that Ani DiFranco is an able poet and on Educated Guess, she is not bad in that regard. DiFranco still has a pretty strong sense of imagery and when one reads her lines "As dolls go I am broken / And you could just let that get us off the hook / But from under the umbrella of the unspoken / I see you giving me that look / Baby, you're right as rain about the benefits / But you might be wrong about the costs / And it feeds my heart that you came looking for me / But I'm thinkin' I need to stay lost" ("Rain Check") one has a strong sense of the emotions and place in life that such lines come from. DiFranco ably expresses strong human emotions with a poetry that is hard to compare to others in the pop-rock field (which is probably why she is labeled as indie rock).

As well, DiFranco has a fearless sense of sex and sensuality to some of her songs. "Bodily," for example, is aching for the physical sense of what a breakup does to a person. She also has a powerful ability to sing about the political, as she does on "Grand Canyon." On that song, she has a wonderful sense of irony when she sings "I love my country / By which I mean / I am indebted joyfully / To all the people throughout its history / Who have fought the government to make right / Where so many cunning sons and daughters / Our foremothers and forefathers / Came singing through slaughter / Came through hell and high water / So that we could stand here . . ." ("Grand Canyon"). DiFranco is not one to simply accept history the way it appears in the books and instead, she combats the normal rhetoric with her strong sense of balance and realism. This is something few artists dare to do musically and DiFranco deserves some credit for at least giving it a try.

That said, not all of her poems are even winners. Take, for example, "Animal," a song plagued by such predictable rhymes as "Looking out through my eyes / At all the traffic on the road to nowhere / At all the shiny stuff around to buy / At all the wires in the air." As well, on songs like "Bliss Like This," she rhymes the same words over and over again with themselves and that, too, is tiresome.

At the end of the day, though, Educated Guess is pretty bland pop-rock that never got popular and the real snag of it is that what might be good is virtually unlistenable given the production or the singing. Fans of Ani DiFranco, fans of music, deserve more. And for those who challenged me for years to give Ani DiFranco a fair shake, I think a month of listening to her albums qualifies and for all those who insist she is the greatest musical artist on the scene today, I gladly offer a second opinion.

The best track is "You Each Time," the low point is "Akido," one of the spoken word tracks.

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Imperfectly
Like I Said (Songs 1990-91)
Out Of Range
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Revelling / Reckoning
So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter
Evolve
Reprieve

4/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Two Discs Of Live Ani DiFranco Add Up To So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter.

The Good: Decent lyrics, Moment of voice
The Bad: Dull music, Unimpressive overall vocals.
The Basics: In another disappointing live album, So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter presents Ani DiFranco singing some of her less great songs in bored tones.


As I eagerly await my next female Artist Of The Month package filled with music I am eagerly anticipating reviewing, I am cleaning up some loose ends from last month, the most significant being finishing off a pair of c.d.s from the Artist Of The Month, Ani DiFranco. DiFranco was a huge disappointment for me after years of being highly recommended by people I actually respect. I suppose these things happen from time to time, but truth be told when one commits to a month of an artist and that artist's works turn out to be a lemon, that can be a pretty hellish month. Fortunately, to break up the interminable pain of listening to Ani DiFranco, I went off and eloped. That made things better, for a time!

The penultimate album of Ani DiFranco's music I have subjected myself to is one of her two-disc live albums which is just painful to listen to over and over again. The album, So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter is a two-disc set of Ani DiFranco singing, performing and creating, but it wears thin. The performances are not incredible and the concert(s) from which the songs are culled is not extraordinary or even interesting. The result is a collection of songs that sound a fair bit like the originals and do not add much to the overall Ani DiFranco musical library.

With a total of twenty-four tracks spread out over the two discs, ten at 62:36 and thirteen at 60:25 , So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter is Ani DiFranco with a limited musical ensemble playing over a decade's worth of her more universal songs. The result is a collection of tracks that is mediocre and does not stand out, but is distinctly Ani DiFranco. DiFranco wrote all of the songs and she produced the albums as well. Apparently culled from two or three concerts (the back of disc 1 is labeled Stray Cats and disc 2 is called Girls Singing Night, but track thirteen is separated from the other twelve), this featured Ani DiFranco singing her own songs as the primary vocalist and playing guitars on most of the tracks.

But, the experience is boring at best and at worst, it is listless. On songs like "You Had Time," DiFranco sounds bored singing her own lyrics and the only thing that makes the song even remotely interesting is the addition of a brass section to the song. Otherwise, DiFranco sings or shouts her way through her old standards with little new on the album. Indeed, because so many of the songs were from her "one woman and a guitar" phase of performance, most of the songs sound remarkably like the previously released studio versions. And vocally, DiFranco shows little growth between those albums and this two-disc set, which makes the listener ask "what's the point?"

As she annoyingly whispers her way through "Swandive" with the guitars engineered to drown out her singing, the listener questions DiFranco's musical sensibilities and by the time her voice is loud enough to be understood, many listeners are cringing at the mediocre lyrics and her presentation of them. While some of her earlier albums were hampered by her emotions - where she would growl out her lyrics more than sing them - on So Much Shouting, So Much Laughter she seems not to care about anything anymore and as a result, the simple guitar and vocals are just boring.

Instrumentally, most of the songs are simple guitar, bass, percussion tracks and the album has occasional live noises of the crown produced into them so we know the audience at the concerts was still alive at that point in the performance. The most recognizable and enjoyable song musically would have to be "32 Flavors" because with "Cradle & All" they are the only songs with real melodies. Throughout the album, DiFranco amelodically rambles through her songs with a listless quality and the instrumental accompaniments are hardly more involved or interested than she is while singing her lines.

What DiFranco has going for her, on some of the songs at least, are her lyrics. DiFranco is a fearless, unabashed feminist and one who loves glorifying women and their experiences. So, it is unsurprising that she would write and perform something with unabashed sexuality like "Dilate." On that song, she sings "When I need to wipe my face / I use the back of my hand / And I like to take up space / Just because I can / And I use my dress / To wipe up my drink / I care less and less / What people think / And you are so lame / You always disappoint me / It's kind of like our running joke / But it's really not funny / And I just want you to live up to / The image of you I create / I see you and I'm so unsatisfied / I see you and I dilate" ("Dilate"). DiFranco has no problem or issue with mixing relationship commentary with sexual imagery and that makes for a few incredible moments on the album, at least lyrically.

Unfortunately, not all of her lyrics are gold. "What How When Where" is presented as one of the most agonizingly boring songs ever with lyrics like "What what what what what did you think you were doing? / How how how how how did you think this would go? / When when when when when you showed up on my radar / Where where where where where did you think you would show?" The song is so repetitive that one wonders why she does it live in that it is hardly as impressive or complex as her better songs. On this album, the version she recorded is more annoying than anything else.

That said, DiFranco does include some songs from a stronger folk-rock tradition on this album and that is a welcome return to form for listeners of her works. When she sings "When I was four years old / They tried to test my I.Q. / They showed me a picture / Of 3 oranges and a pear / They said, / 'Which one is different? / It does not belong' / They taught me different is wrong" ("My I.Q.") the listener knows DiFranco is still alive and kicking with something real to say. On songs like that and "Letter To A John," DiFranco cements herself as a songwriter with a purpose, even if she does not always illustrate it wonderfully.

That said, Ani DiFranco is largely uninspired on this two-disc set and it comes through in both her song choices and the way she presents the live songs. Listeners will be left wanting more, even her fans.

The best tracks are "Napoleon" (disc 1) and "32 Flavors" (disc 2) and the low points are "What How When Where" (disc 1) and "Jukebox" (disc 2).

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Imperfectly
Like I Said (Songs 1990-91)
Out Of Range
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Revelling / Reckoning
Evolve
Reprieve

5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my Music Index Page!

© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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W.L.'s Current Artist Of The Month, Ani DiFranco Fails To Evolve And Underwhelms!

The Good: Does not sound bad, Soft and melodic music, A few lyrics
The Bad: Vocally, musically and lyrically underwhelming.
The Basics: Evolve is one of Ani DiFranco's technically most musical albums, but vocally is poorly produced to obscure her lyrics in a disappointing way.


I do not, honestly, believe that my new wife is going to leave me for my musical choices or any sense that I am lacking in musical taste. This is, of course, my hope - that she not leave - but one never knows. In addition to taking a keen interest in how much time I spend writing and posting reviews, my wife seems to enjoy spending time in the same room as me, even when I am working. The thing about that is that in order to keep up any sense of musical exploration and reviewing ability in music, I have to have music playing almost constantly. As a result, my wife ends up hearing a lot of my music and if she is not into the artist, she gets quite bothered.

My partner is eagerly awaiting next month. My next Artist Of The Month is Fleetwood Mac. My wife does not know if she will like Fleetwood Mac, but our monthlong exploration of Ani DiFranco has cemented in her one thing: she is not a fan of Ani DiFranco. As we boil down to the last two albums I have in stock of DiFranco's, I am able to honestly observe that I am not a fan of Ani DiFranco's music either. Her early albums we amelodic and annoying with nasal vocals and songs that were certainly political and interesting, but hardly musical. Now that we are into her later albums, like Evolve, we are discovering an Ani DiFranco who is musical but hardly interesting at all. Evolve, an album from 2003, is musical, but does not have any distinctive tunes, hooks or melodies that make individual tracks stand out and none of the lyrics are as audacious as on any of her other albums that I have listened to. The result is an album that is remarkably easy to pass by.

With only a dozen songs coming in at 57:29, Evolve is an underperforming Ani DiFranco, but it is definitely Ani DiFranco's music and concept. DiFranco wrote all of the songs on the album and she performs all of the guitars and main vocals as well. As well, she plays the piano on two of the songs. While the album does not note in its liners any producer, DiFranco is cited as the only mixer for the album, so it is very hard to argue that this is anything but the album that she intended to release.

That said, Evolve is two things: musically rich and painfully boring. After ten replays of the album, I have no idea what the album is about. This is not because I am particularly dense or that the music is particularly complicated, but rather that DiFranco has managed to mumble and slur her vocals and prioritize the instrumentals over the vocals for the entirety of the album. In other words, she makes music and I can hear her voice, but none of the lyrics leap out at the listener.

For a sense of contrast, I ask readers to consider DiFranco's first big song, "Both Hands." When DiFranco sings the refrain about holding onto love with both hands, her vocals come forth clear, melodic and beautiful. She enunciates and articulates and it is a beautiful sound and musical presence. On Evolve, there are no tracks, no lines even like that. On her worst-sounding albums, there were moments where DiFranco would stop the music and belt out a line about whatever cause she was railing against in that particular song and it was wonderful because the listener could hear her, understand her and she had a message she wanted listeners to grasp and grapple with.

On Evolve, DiFranco is accompanied by a full band and she seems not to care so much about being understood with her vocals as she does about making a sound that flows. And on Evolve, the music does flow. The instrumentals create a background sound that is light rock and the entire album melts into a mellow, somewhat depressive mush that is unmemorable after the listener finishes with it. To wit, I began my many listens of Evolve last night and this morning when I began listening again, the experience was more or less new to me!

That said, songs like "Serpentine" with their excessive instrumentals - it is over ten minutes of music - are interesting when separated out from the other songs on the album and might actually be interesting and decent music, were it not for the fact that all of the other songs are similarly low-key and the guitars and pianos seem to muse to one another in the exact same ways on all of the tracks.

As well, Ani DiFranco seems more depressed as she sings these songs. There are no rallying cries, nothing unique or clever that she sings in a way that makes the songs memorable or even passably interesting. Instead, the listener is left with a melancholy feeling as she meanders through her slow, mid-range vocals. This is a very slow and unmemorable album.

Lyrically, Evolve is better than most of the rest of the album, but DiFranco's performance of her own lines drags the work down. As a result, songs like "Icarus" read as poems much better than they come across on the album. She is thematically and poetically audacious in her lines "Breathe like it's rolling like a cold front / Thunder is thundering and lightening in tow / And your tiny little life gets / Even smaller / As you heed the heaven's mighty show / And I don't mean heaven / Like god-like / The animal in me knows very well / Nature is our teacher, our leader, and our lover / And god is just another story that we tell" ("Icarus"), but she does not present the lines in music form in a way that indicates she has the emotional muscle to back up her assertive declarations or opinions. The result is she sounds like she is lacking in confidence on the album.

But when read, the lyrics on Evolve actually seem to have something to say. It is a shame that she mumbles through phrases like "So we took down all the pictures / And then we took down all the walls / Packed up our expectations / Piled them in the hall / Yeah we bagged our future / Kicked it to the curb / And then we stood there unencumbered / And we stood there undeterred / 'Cause we were done clinging / To the things we were afraid to lose" ("In The Way"). Clearly DiFranco still has something to say and lyically, "In The Way" is an amazing song that deserves to be expressed, heard and comprehended. DiFranco still has some serious abilities as a musical storyteller. But the track lacks such auditory distinction that it could honestly be playing right now and I would not know it. (As it is, the disc just began replaying from the beginning.)

But even lyrically, the album is not DiFranco's most consistent. "Here For Now" is plagued by predictable and boring rhymes like ". . .And the moment when your heart jumps in all that's happening / It's like the first time you felt that shock / Yes, your heart jumps in all that's happening / And I was right behind the door when you knocked." DiFranco apparently both paved the way for Morissette and Lavigne with rhyming the same word with itself, but when she mumbles through it, she does not get a number one song.

All in all, Evolve is terribly boring pop-rock music and were it not for the general technical merits of it, there is no way it would be rated this high even.

The best track is "Serpentine," the low point is the utterly unmemorable "Shrug."

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Imperfectly
Like I Said (Songs 1990-91)
Out Of Range
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Revelling / Reckoning
Reprieve

5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my Music Review Index Page!

© 2012, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Inoffensive Ani, Out Of Range Is Remarkably Average Folk-Rock Music.

The Good: A few good lyrics, Decent vocals, Interesting enough instrumentals.
The Bad: Not the most forceful or interesting songs, Short
The Basics: Out Of Range is a close recommend as it is inoffensive, but also uninteresting Ani DiFranco.


I wonder if many reviewers who catch releases right when they come out ever go back years later and re-evaluate the recordings they praised with experience that comes from years. I have been tempted to occasionally do that, but there are only so many hours in the day and going back to revise old reviews would be a full time job in and of itself in my case! But, often enough, artists go back and re-evaluate their earlier works from a place of perspective after a few years have passed and my experience has been that there have been albums that critics have highly praised that the artist will later admit that they were phoning in.

I mention this at the top of my review of Ani DiFranco's Out Of Range for no particular reason. My current female Artist Of The Month has never, to my knowledge, disavowed the album in any way or returned to it with critical words. But seeing how positively my fellow reviewers have rated it made me wonder how many might have reviewed as part of the hype back in the day. Listening to the album now on heavy replay, I find myself underwhelmed and at best I consider the album to be listenable, but ultimately unmemorable. On this album, Ani DiFranco moves more into the rock tradition from the folk-rock place she had been at and she sounds instrumentally decent, but largely inoffensive. This is an uncontroversial album and one that is good, but hard to consider exceptional in any way.

With only a dozen tracks (eleven songs as the title track of the album appears twice on it in electric and acoustic forms), Out Of Range is an unsatisfyingly short 47:52. Still, this 1994 incarnation of Ani DiFranco's is distinctly Ani. DiFranco, as is her tradition, wrote all of the songs and provides the lead vocals on each and every track. As well, DiFranco plays acoustic, electric and steel guitars depending upon the track. She also adds in her piano on "You Had Time" and that has a quiet, beautiful sound to it that is distinct on the album. Out Of Range was only co-produced by DiFranco (she gives her engineer Ed Stone a co-producer credit with her), but it still seems to be her musical vision being expressed on the album.

Whereas most Ani DiFranco albums are political, emotionally poignant and often enough challenge the establishment with their lyrics, with key lines being articulated for maximum offense to the prudes or squares she wants to rock the boat with, Out Of Range is a musical mush. This might well be the point in DiFranco's career where she began to produce her instrumentals over her vocals. This is ironic because on her earlier albums when she had something to say and she sang it with a sense of indignant anger against the world, she often performed her vocals with a nasal quality that was just terrible. Here, she is musical with her vocals, but she keeps the guitars and drums produced at such a volume that they are at or louder than her vocals. The result is that whatever her message is, it is hardly at the forefront as it is on other albums.

In other words, Ani DiFranco might have something to say on Out Of Range, but it all comes out as auditory mush that fails to make its mark on the listener. Indeed, this is fairly generic light pop-rock music that titillates the ears and then is easily forgotten. Unlike other albums, there are no starts and stops, no silences wherein DiFranco cries out and makes a grand point or emotional statement.

Vocally, DiFranco carries her notes. Only on the electric version of Out Of Range does she sing-speak as opposed to straight singing. DiFranco carries her voice in the alto and slightly lower range most the rest of the album and throughout one may hear her voice and she is musical. Unfortunately, she either mumbles or overproduces the instrumentals to keep the listener from being able to focus well on what she is singing. The result is that the instrumentals dominate.

As for the instrumentals, Out Of Range has a fairly rich sound . . . or at least as much as a guitar, bass, drums combo can have. Many tracks do not even have a bass, but songs like "Face Up And Sing" sound like they could have come from virtually any pop-rock artist who is playing the same three instruments. There is nothing truly imaginative, which is probably why "You Had Time" stands out on the album. Being a piano-driven track on an otherwise guitar-driven work is distinctive, if not impressive. But for a true understanding of how little impact the instrumentals make, listening to the album on constant replay, the acoustic and electric versions of the title track are so unimpressive in their differences that I often had to check the track number to see which one was playing!

As for the lyrics, the album is less political than DiFranco's earlier works, to be sure. This is a more personal album and the lyrics are generally less incredible than her other works as well. So, for example, despite the message of the song Out Of Range, with its lines "Boys get locked up in some prison / Girls get locked up in some house / And it don't matter if it's a warden / Or a lover / Or a spouse / You just can't talk to 'em / You just can't reason / You just can't leave / And you just can't please 'em," the song has a ridiculously repetitive quality to it. The song becomes monotonous within itself and on the album given the sense of repetition, making it a drag on the overall album.

On the plus side, DiFranco still has an interesting sense of imagery and metaphor. When she writes and sings "Life is a b movie / It's stupid and it's strange / A directionless story / And the dialogue is lame / But in the he said she said / Sometimes there's some poetry / If you turn your back long enough / And let it happen naturally" ("Hell Yeah") she creates a vivid concept that almost any listener can relate to. DiFranco captures the sound or feeling of disaffected youth quite well and that she does it without being noisy or obnoxious is pretty wonderful.

And it is not like DiFranco has abandoned her folk roots on this album. She still sings musical storysongs. However, some, like "The Diner" are arguably not her best. She pens the lines "I miss watching you / Drool on your pillow / I miss watching you / Pull on your clothes / I miss listening / To you in the bathroom / Flushing the toilet / Blowing your nose" ("The Diner") and they are repetitive, unenthusiastic and largely uninteresting, much like the rest of the album.

The album suffers most because Ani DiFranco is not focusing on her strengths, but there is little that is extraordinary or offensive, making this a remarkably average experience. The best track is "You Had Time." The low point is "If He Tries Anything."

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Imperfectly
Like I Said (Songs 1990-91)
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Revelling / Reckoning
Reprieve

5.5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Revelling/Reckoning Is Another Ani DiFranco Miss (This One An Overproduced Miss!)

The Good: There is a lot of music, One or two lyrics
The Bad: Instrumentally overproduced, Bland singing.
The Basics: Despite a decent mix of musical styles, Ani DiFranco fails to wow with the two-disc Revelling/Reckoning, in part by saying little, in part by obscuring what she does sing.


As I look to burn through the last of my current female Artist Of The Month's c.d.s that I have in stock, I find myself contemplating the body of Ani DiFranco's works. DiFranco came to me highly recommended as I tend to have a strong love of female singer-songwriters. In her early works, I discovered an artist with a powerful social message who was severely limited on the musical front. Her "one woman and a guitar" sound quickly grew tired to my ears as I played her early albums on high replay. As well, her singing voice was often annoying and nasal to the point of being unlistenable.

With her two-disc set Revelling and Reckoning, Ani DiFranco overcomes yet again many of the early limitations of her music. Unfortunately, on this two-disc set, she runs almost to the other end of the spectrum. Here, DiFranco produces her way out of anything listenable or comprehensible on a great number of her songs. Given that DiFranco wrote and produced the album, this once again raises the question of why she would bother. Why write something, why operate with enough passion to strike out on your own with something to say if you don't want people to understand it?! Over the course of the scattered two-disc set, DiFranco plays in multiple musical styles in a way that sounds more sloppy than artistic, more indecisive than stylistic and the end result is an album that could have come from any number of pop-rock artists, as opposed to a true independent who is doing her own thing.

With twenty-nine tracks coming in at just under two hours of music, Revelling/Reckoning is certainly one of DiFranco's most ambitious original efforts. Revelling has thirteen tracks (58:59) and Reckoning is endowed with sixteen tracks (59:11), all of which are written by Ani DiFranco. DiFranco provides lead vocals on all of the songs and she plays most of the instruments as well. On these two albums, DiFranco plays acoustic, electric and baritone guitars, various drums, the key bass, and tambur. In fact, the only instrument on the album she does not play is the saxophone and only one other artist appears on the albums to provide backing vocals. So, DiFranco clearly has instrumental abilities which have overcome her early limited sound. As well, the album is produced by Ani DiFranco, so it is inarguable that this is not her own musical vision and that these albums were not the albums she wanted to make.

Vocally, there is little to say about Revelling/Reckoning. DiFranco sings within a pretty limited range on the albums, mostly in the alto registers. She sing-speaks her way through most of the songs, but more troubling than her voice - which is not nasal on the songs for a change - is that it is almost inaudible. DiFranco managed to producer her vocals such that they cannot be heard in many cases. They are blended with other people's vocals on songs like the album opener "Ain't That The Way."

To be fair, DiFranco does challenge her prior ranges stylistically and vocally on Revelling/Reckoning. She has a more funk/goove sound on "O.K.," waltzes through "Marrow" and presents a pretty average folk-rock performance on "Kazoointoit." She even has something of a rap on "Ain't That The Way." But the problem DiFranco runs into is that just because she is experimenting with various musical styles does not mean she is succeeding with her experiments. So, for example, the rap on "Ain't That The Way" is virtually impossible to listen to, it is so lame.

Instrumentally, Revelling/Reckoning scores points for diversity and range of instrumentals. DiFranco is not limited by any one musical style on these albums either, making it virtually impossible to classify this work as simply "folk-rock." It is not pop-rock, either, as it was never popular. "Whatall Is Nice" has a classic folk sound to it, but it is definitely the exception to the rule. Revelling/Reckoning is a hodgepodge of various musical styles and while some artists can pull off such collections of genres as intriguing albums, this pair of albums does not have the cohesion or quality to be considered truly great. Instead, it comes across as sloppy and the listener is more likely to be bored than fascinated by DiFranco and her attempt.

Moreover, after listening to the albums on high replay for days, I cannot identify a single tune. There are no recognizable or memorable melodies on either album and the result is that while there are many styles reflected in the work, there is nothing so memorable as to call the listener back to these albums. Ever.

Which brings us to the lyrics. Outside of having most of the lyrics obscured by production which more often than not puts the instrumentals in front of the vocals in distracting ways (the deeper chords of the instrumentals on "Whatall Is Nice" drown out the vocals, despite the intensity which which DiFranco sings them), the lyrics are not all of DiFranco's best. In fact, off the first album, after a dozen listens, the only lines that I remember immediately are the title question words to the song "What How When Where (Why Who)," and I recall them mostly because they annoyed me.

But songs like "Reckoning" seem more loaded with predictable metaphors than the imaginative ones DiFranco traditionally used. When DiFranco sings "I've replayed a thousand times exactly what was said. / 'Cause nothing is as it appears / And the fun house mirrors of your fears / On a roller coaster of all these years / With your hands above your head /And win or lose, just that we chose, this little war is what kills us" ("Reckoning"), I find myself more bored than enlightened. This is not a fresh way of discussing conflict at all and fans are likely to expect more from DiFranco than they get here.

This is not to say that DiFranco is devoid of her usual social commentary. On "Subdivision," for example, she pens and performs the lines "White people are so scared of black people / They bulldoze out to the country, and put up houses on little loop-d-loop streets / And while america gets its heart cut right out of its chest, the berlin wall still runs down main street / Separating east side from west" which are certainly not lines one hears in most pop-rock songs. DiFranco deserves some credit for continuing to try to challenge the establishment and the presumed order of things. It used to be, though, listeners could understand what she was singing when she did. It's fairly frustrating to listen intently to DiFranco only to get simple, obvious metaphors on light and dark.

The result is a two-disc set that is easy to pass by. Revelling/Reckoning disappoints. Period.

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Imperfectly
Like I Said (Songs 1990-91)
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Reprieve

4/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Another Ridiculous "Best Of" For Two Albums! Like I Said May Be Left Behind.

The Good: Generally decent lyrics
The Bad: Limited instrumentals, Often lousy vocals, Short
The Basics: Ani DiFranco underwhelms with a compilation from two albums with Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) which will not impress fans or those looking to become fans.


A few years back, I found myself surprised and dismayed when Sophie B. Hawkins left Columbia (Sony) Records to start her own label that Sony released The Best Of Sophie B. Hawkins when she left. This silly compilation album was Sony exploiting the material Hawkins left behind to make a dime off the work from the artist that was no longer associated with them. Hawkins had bought back the works from her third album, so all Columbia had they could release was material from her first two albums and a single Hawkins had made for a compilation album. At least with Sophie B. Hawkins, the record company worked without her knowledge or legal ability to stop them.

It is, then, pretty ridiculous that Ani DiFranco, who owns her own record label, would pull a similar stunt with her own work. Her 1993 album, Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) is a simple compilation of her first two albums which were still easily available (and still are) when the compilation was released. The album is pointless, boring and an uninspired collection. Later compilations that either were true "best of" albums or offered the same old songs live made a lot more sense than Like I Said (Songs 1990-91). There is something weird and disturbing about an artist simply re-releasing a mix of their other albums only a few years after their initial release. And, again, because DiFranco holds the rights to the originals and the original albums are still out there, the purpose of Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) is not entirely clear. Well, unless that purpose is for DiFranco to exploit her fan base and make some money! If that is the case, well then, this makes perfect sense!

With fifteen songs, clocking out at 48:28, Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) is the works of Ani DiFranco culled from her first two recordings, Ani DiFranco and Not So Soft without any new tracks. The thing is, both albums could have just about filled a single c.d. with fewer cuts than this. As it is, the failure to even use the full capacity of the compact disc is disturbing and for an artist as prolific as Ani DiFranco, this is disappointing - even for those who might not be wowed by her music.

But this is distinctly the work of folk-rock artist Ani DiFranco. DiFranco wrote all fifteen songs and she sings lead vocals on each and every one as well. DiFranco plays guitar on all of the songs as well and it is in every way her musical vision and ability that is collected here. She is credited with co-producing the album, so that this is that album she wanted to put out there is virtually inarguable. When one considers that this is an unnecessary compilation to begin with, it seems odd to think DiFranco might have included anything that she did not want or like in its original form. So, it is fair to say Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) is DiFranco's version of her best songs from this era in her career, at least as she considered them . . . two years later!

The fundamental problem with Like I Said (Songs 1990-91), outside being thoroughly unnecessary given the duration of DiFranco's career at that point, is that DiFranco was not at her best in those years. Instrumentally, DiFranco is remarkably limited on this album. She is one woman with a guitar and she sounds exactly like what she is. As a result, this incarnation of Ani DiFranco is stark, acoustic and bland. DiFranco here sounds like any number of talented young women who might be traveling in the coffeehouse singing circuit to try to entertain crowds of college students who go based on the word of friends who have heard her before. The songs on Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) illustrate no abundance of talent for DiFranco on the guitar and some of the songs have virtually identical guitar sounds, like "Anticipate" and "Out Of Habit."

Even worse are DiFranco's vocals. At least with my experiences with coffeehouse grrrls, they have voices that support their message. In short, they have vocal abilities. They are on stage singing their hearts out because they can sing. DiFranco has a nasal singing voice that is just annoying on this album. She might have heart, but she seldom illustrates an ability to sing clearly and melodically, save on one or two songs like "Both Hands." Instead, most of the songs are more like "The Slant" where DiFranco speaks without even trying to pretend she is singing. Okay, that is not entirely fair; other songs she accompanies her voice with an instrument to pretend what she is doing is singing, but the result is more of a speak-singing that is amelodic and droning as opposed to actually musical.

What keeps DiFranco and Like I Said (Songs 1990-91) from the lowest possible rating are her lyrics. While I might not be wowed by their presentation or the esoteric nature of the compilation, DiFranco has the ability to write. DiFranco is fearlessly feminist and she sings about things that few other people dare to. That unabashed sense of persona is a welcome change and her lines "I opened a bank account / When I was nine years old / I closed it when I was eighteen / I gave them every penny that I'd saved / And they gave my blood / And my urine / A number / Now I'm sitting in this waiting room / Playing with the toys / And I am here to exercise / My freedom of choice / I passed their handheld signs / Went through their picket lines" ("Lost Woman Song") are unlike anything else in music, certainly different from the blase songs being heard on the radios back in the early 1990s or even today.

Still, some of DiFranco's songs on this album are not her most lyrically impressive. Others, for example, seem to like "Rush Hour" better than I do. But hearing "Rush hour / And the day's dawning / The rain came / And pushed me under the awning / The puddles grew and threw themselves at me / With every passing car / I'm shielding my guitar" ("Rush Hour") over and over again on high repeat leaves me indifferent. Sometimes DiFranco uses remarkably simple rhyme schemes and she does not wow those who look to her for a strong sense of relationship realism.

That said, DiFranco does include "Both Hands," a legitimate hit for her that ought to have made her loved outside just the folk-rock circuit. On that song, DiFranco was articulate and came up with amazing imagery. Indeed, it is hard not to hear or read her lines "In each other's shadows we grew less and less tall / And eventually our theories couldn't explain it all / And I'm recording our history now on the bedroom wall / And when we leave the landlord will come / And paint over it all" ("Both Hands") and not feel the sense of loneliness and loss that the song is all about.

Still, there is not enough on this album to keep listeners seriously interested or intrigued by it and anyone who likes Ani DiFranco will find more value in avoiding this and getting the two albums this culls from. And for those not into DiFranco's music, this is not the best compilation or album to try to woo new listeners with.

The best song is "Both Hands," the low point is the bland "Not So Soft."

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Imperfectly
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Reprieve

3/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Adequately Titled, Imperfectly Lives Up To Its Name As A Disappointing Ani DiFranco Album!

The Good: Good lyrics
The Bad: Boring music, Terrible vocals, Short
The Basics: Dull and musically and vocally bad, Imperfectly is a real miss by Ani DiFranco!


As one who values the concept of balance in reviews, I suppose there ought to be a part of me that is thrilled to be spending the month reviewing the works of Ani DiFranco. After all, by having so much material that I am not enjoying, I am able to keep a decent sense about my overall reviews and I am not simply reviewing things that I like. At the same time, as a person who sits down and listens to a ton of c.d.s in order to be able to write music reviews consistently is beginning to get a bit peeved and is eager for something - anything! - that stimulates my ears and I actually enjoy again. It seems like it has been so long since I last heard something that actually stimulated me and I wanted to eagerly recommend and tell everyone about.

Therefore, the latest Ani DiFranco disappointment I find myself listening to is Imperfectly, an album I am fairly shocked to see I am the first one to pan. At the beginning of the month, I would have been shocked because I had so many people telling me of the greatness of Ani DiFranco, I would have been surprised to discover so many of them were so wrong about her music. Now, though, I am surprised that - even as I recognize I have high standards based upon listening to a plethora of different types of music - I am the only one who apparently is bored with the bland vocals, listless instrumentals and repetitive messages of Ani DiFranco. And I was one who was biased toward her when I started my exploration of her works!

With thirteen songs coming in at 43:59, Imperfectly is the worst Ani DiFranco album I've listened to to date. The album is distinctly the work of Ani DiFranco. DiFranco wrote all thirteen songs and she provides lead vocals on every song. As well, she plays acoustic guitar on virtually every song, though she plays slide guitar, some percussion and coffee grounds on other songs. On the production end, DiFranco is one of the album's three co-producers. In other words, this is her vision and it is hard to argue that DiFranco is anything other than a true artist with real ambition.

On Imperfectly, though, the question is not one of ambition, it is a question of ability. This is a poor outing for DiFranco and some of the songs that are on here are just dogs and others have been performed better by DiFranco on live albums. So, for example, "Every State Line" appears on Imperfectly screeched out atonally and plaintively in a way that is utterly boring. The same song appears on one of her live albums accompanied by instruments with a richer sound and DiFranco performing more melodically. Conversely, "Circle Of Light" is instrumentally richer than most any song on the album, but DiFranco's vocals are equally grating and whiny.

As a feminist, there is something supremely disappointing about hearing a musical artist like DiFranco who clearly has something to say, but performs it with a monotonous way that is virtually unlistenable. On Imperfectly, this is present in both the instrumentals and vocals. The instrumentals are boring to the point where replaying the album over and over again does not net a sound that is indistinct, but rather one that is painful for the aural limitations of the works. DiFranco on Imperfectly is often one woman with a guitar and this is exactly what she sounds like instrumentally. The thing is, it is possible to be one woman and a guitar and still make interesting music. Unfortunately, DiFranco does not on this album. Instead, she strums about the same three chords with barely enough musical accompaniment to call the tracks "songs" without creating anything recognizable enough to call a tune or a harmony.

As for the vocals, DiFranco presents her vocals with a blandly assertive quality that becomes tiresome the longer the album goes on. It seems no matter what DiFranco is singing on Imperfectly, she is presenting it with the same sense of urgency and desperation. Between that and the nasal quality she infuses to her singing voice, the vocals . . . well, they are just plain terrible. On songs like "Good, Bad, Ugly," her voice alternated between speaking more than singing and singing through her nose. Either way, the song falls down because whatever she is singing is presented in such an unpalatable way. This is the plague of much of Imperfectly. "Coming Up" features vocals where DiFranco speaks over herself on separate tracks and the chaos is unlistenable.

So, what usually encourages fans of Ani DiFranco to ignore the musical shortcomings of DiFranco are her lyrics. But on Imperfectly, DiFranco's lines are not her most impressive by any means or any stretch of the imagination. So, for example, on "Good, Bad, Ugly" her rhymes are positively boring when she sings "And it's bad / That I took that second look / I guess I'm an open book / You know I didn't really intend / To embrace you that long / But then again I wasn't the only one / Holding on." DiFranco is known for folk-rock storysongs, but "Good, Bad, Ugly" does not tell even a remotely interesting storysong, nor does its follow-up, "I'm No Heroine."

More than that, some of her sentiments are positively baffling, especially from the feminist perspective. I just don't get why those interested in feminism, grrrl power or even just gender equality would rally to lines like "He looks me up and down / Like he knows what time it is / Like he's got my number / Like he thinks it's his / He says, / 'Call me, Miss DiFranco, / If there's anything I can do' / I say, / 'It's Mr. DiFranco to you'" ("In Or Out"). When DiFranco presents a female musical protagonist who wants to be called "Mr.," one suspects she loses all but her most militant fans.

Also largely absent on Imperfectly is a strong sense of social commentary, which is something DiFranco is known for. Here, she makes a passing effort mostly with "Every State Line," which explores the contradictions of states rights vs. a sense of national identity. The most passionate she gets in the song is when she sings "I'm in the middle of Alabama / They stare at me where ever I go / I don't think they like my haircut / I don't think they like my clothes / I can't wait to get back to New York City / Where at least when I walk down the street / Nobody ever hesitates / To tell me exactly what they think of me" ("Every State Line"). This type of self-referential indignancy is hardly as interesting as, for example, calling world leaders out for getting nations into war, avoiding civil rights issues or promoting the spread of AIDS.

The result is that Imperfectly is not only easy to pass on, but easy to encourage listeners to avoid. Even though I might not be enjoying Ani DiFranco as my April Artist Of The Month, I can easily differentiate between the better works by her . . . and this. Anyone who loves Ani DiFranco would do well to steer clear of this one.

The best song is "Every State Line," the rest of the album is unlistenable.

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle
Reprieve

1.5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Indistinct Ani: Reprieve Is A Relaxation Away From The Memorable.

The Good: A few lyrics, Moments of voice or music
The Bad: Most of the music, vocals and lyrics
The Basics: Ani DiFranco disappoints with Reprieve, an album whose best songs are all dated and the rest gel together in an indistinct "one woman and a guitar" sound.


Have you ever listened to a c.d. on heavy rotation several times only to come away from the experience unsure what it is you have listened to? I call albums that fail to leave any impression "indistinct" and I am slowly building a library of reviews of albums that are utterly indistinct. In fact, virtually every major artist I have encountered seems to have at least one album where the work leaves virtually no impression. For Ani DiFranco, that album is Reprieve.

Reprieve is a dated work from 2006 that continues Ani DiFranco's folk-rock musical tradition, though this time there are fewer universal storysongs and more in the way of specific references to events in the United States during the Bush Administration. Unlike something like the song "Empire" from the Dar Williams album My Better Self where Williams attacks the Bush Administration policies in broad strokes that could be useful should another authoritarian leader take over, DiFranco references Halliburton and Enron ("Millennium Theater") and tattoos ("Shroud") (tattoos in mainstream are very much a fad of now, as opposed to even ten years ago - in the '90s, one might remember, it was all piercings!) which place a very specific context to many of her songs. And while DiFranco might have something to say lyrically, she has almost no ability to say them musically as she whisps her way through the album in a way that leaves virtually no impression.

With thirteen songs, clocking out at 46:36, Reprieve is Ani DiFranco at some of her most bland. DiFranco sings, plays guitars and "all other instruments" outside what her three accompanists perform, and wrote the music and lyrics for all of the songs. As well, she mixed and produced Reprieve and as a result, it is hard to argue that the resulting album is anything other than her musical vision and her desired sense of self expression.

The problem is, from the first musing piano and guitar chords of "Hypnotized," DiFranco mumbles her way through a folk rock experience utterly lacking in any sense of power or empowerment. "Hypnotized," for example, is lyrically repetitive and musically bland in a way that lulls the listener into a stupor. The problem with the album Reprieve, though, is that DiFranco never breaks the listener out of that stupor. She sinks the listener in and never wakes them up. As a result, the album can play on replay several times without leaving the listener satisfied or thinking they have even heard anything. It is, in the truest sense of the word, indistinct music.

Instrumentally, most of the album is a well-produced "one woman and a guitar" sound. But every song sounds like DiFranco in a spotlight, singing her heart out with effort, but not force. There is a homogenous sound to the album that quickly becomes monotonous. Indeed, the whole idea of "I don't hear a single" certainly applies to this album. None of the songs stand out from each other and none of them especially stand out in general, either.

Vocally, DiFranco is melodic, but none of the songs she sings have anything remotely recognizable as a melody that endures. Having listened to the album a dozen times now, I could not recall a single tune. Indeed, as I write this and the piano and guitar flow and float slowly over my ears, I have no idea what I am hearing. The instrumentals on Reprieve have about as much substance as the wind. At least DiFranco is not screeching or utilizing a nasal tone for this album.

Beyond that, Reprieve lets down fans and well-wishers of Ani DiFranco because the lyrics are not up to her usual standards. A poignant example might well be "A Spade." On that song, DiFranco rails quietly against war and misogyny, religious intolerance and intolerance in general, with bland lines like "I will not lie down / On the wrongful ground or play / While it's still a radical sound / Just to call a spade a spade . . . I mean, how's this supposed to look to me / But half of divinity / Out there trying to make harmony / With only one voice" ("A Spade"). When DiFranco avoids being confrontational and pleads, the lines come out less interesting than when she vocally picks fights. Her antiwar, antinuclear, pro-feminist song Reprieve is similarly simple and mediocre on the lyrics front.

This is not to say DiFranco has lost all of her fire or her relevance. Indeed, at a time when other artists were avoiding calling out the Bush Administration, she wrote and sang "Ramadan orange alert / Everybody put on your gas mask / First leak it out about the president / Then stand up and shout "impeachment" / Pulling coat tails out from under that little V.P. / Before he has a chance to get in the driver's seat . . . Trickle down Israel / Patriarchies realign / The ice caps melt / And New Orleans bides her time" ("Millennium Theater"). The problem is that this makes Reprieve much more a subject of its times than an enduring album. Moreover, for all of her fans who applaud the audacity of Ani DiFranco, such statements were far safer for artists to be singing about in 2006 than, say, on September 12, 2001.

But when she is not being dated, she is pandering to the coffeehouse, college town audiences with lines like "I hate you sometimes / But I love to be your queen / You are my muse / Got me smoking nicotine" ("Nicotine"). The rhymes DiFranco is using are not particularly audacious or even interesting and "Nicotine" is a good example of how she seems to have hit a rut and is happy to flop down in it as opposed to innovating lyrically.

Ultimately, then, it is the lack of audacity that sinks Reprieve. The album sounds like wind, ethereal and bland . . . yes, indistinct in a way that makes fans of folk-rock hesitant to acknowledge this.

The best song is "Millennium Theater," the rest of the album is pretty much mush.

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Ani DiFranco
Not So Soft
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle

4.5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ani DiFranco Opens With An Average Debut That Underwhelms

The Good: "Both Hands" is a legitimately great song, Moments of voice/lyrics
The Bad: Repetitive sound, Short, Bland
The Basics: Ani DiFranco is a thoroughly average debut for a vastly overrated folk-rock artist.


While I have worked to get through my extensive backlog of reviews - a near impossibility since my fiance moved in with me - I have heard a lot from other people in my house about my music. After all, when one shares a floor with a loved one, it is natural that they will pipe in with their two cents. Since my study of Ani DiFranco began, I've been getting sidelong glances and glares and every now and then, my fiance growls, "Shouldn't your criteria for your Artist Of The Month be that the artist is actually good?" I wish I had room to disagree with her.

Having worked my way back to the debut album of Ani DiFranco, appropriately titled Ani DiFranco, I am surprised that this no-hit wonder (DiFranco has a loyal audience, but has never achieved mainstream success or even much in the way of radio airplay outside the college radio circuit and, one supposes, alternative stations. In fact, outside her loyal audience and Buffalo, NY, there are many people who have never even heard of Ani DiFranco) endured long enough to make a living off her music. While many folk-rock debut albums illustrate potential for an artist, Ani DiFranco shows little hope, though some of her subsequent albums are even worse. The thing is, fans and casual listeners might well be bowled over by the greatness of the opening track, "Both Hands" or the vocal decency of "Talk To Me Now," which is the second song, but those who objectively listen to the entire album, especially on replay, are likely to find, as I have, that it is average at best.

With thirteen tracks - "The Slant" is a poem, not actually a song - clocking out at 46:53, Ani DiFranco is a rather traditional and mundane folk-rock debut by a musical artist whose strength is clearly in her lyrics and writing skills as opposed to her musical abilities. The album lives up to its title and is very much the musical vision of Ani DiFranco as each song was written and performed by her. The compact disc does not have instrumental credits, but it seems likely DiFranco performed her guitars as she is known for them and much of her sound on this album is the "lone woman with a guitar" musical experience. DiFranco is credited as the album's sole producer and for a debut album this is quite extraordinary, though given that DiFranco founded her own label to release her music, this is less surprising.

Ani DiFranco on Ani DiFranco has something to say, but her tone is monotonous, her instrumentation is dull and the only shining beacon on the album is the quality of her lyrics. Indeed, had the songs on this album been released as poetry instead, it is of a quality that would likely intrigue and engage those who appreciate more highbrow publications like The New Yorker. Well, it would, if she punctuated and spaced it differently, but as far as diction and message goes, Ani DiFranco is rich with lyrical depth and meaning that is likely to stimulate listeners and engage them.

The problem, though, is that DiFranco fails to engage the listener with her musical abilities. After a dozen listens, the only recognizable tune on the entire album is that of "Both Hands" (and to be fair, I've been listening to an a cappella version of it for years, so that might bias me toward that even!). "Work Your Way Out" and "Dog Coffee" are more emblematic of the instrumental sensibilities on Ani DiFranco with their seemingly random guitar strummings and lack of a melody. "Pale Purple" begins with a melancholy guitar that is virtually identical to the way "Talk To Me Now" opens and even "Rush Hour," which I have heard in other incarnations, lacks anything recognizable as a tune.

Vocally, Ani DiFranco peaks early on the album. "Both Hands" is melodic and beautiful, though even there she treads toward the nasal sound in her vocals. She is beautifully soprano for the difficult lines of "Talk To Me Now," but after that the album falls apart on the vocals. "Pale Purple" illustrates wonderful soprano vocals which DiFranco mumbles her way inarticulately through, then produces her guitar strummings over. The songs are presented more in a hushed speaking-singing that is annoying to listen to. On "Rush Hour," for example, she sounds like she is singing half through her nose and her vocals are melodramatically presented such that she makes it sound like each line is a pain for her to get out.

In other words, it is very easy to tire quickly of the sound of Ani DiFranco on her debut. And what keeps the listener listening, arguably, is her lyrics. Ani DiFranco is someone who has something to say. The problem with much of the album is that she does not seem to want to expend the energy to sing it or say it clearly. The result is a folk-rock album that sounds like the work of an amateur.

But DiFranco is not writing like an amateur, even on this debut. Take, for example, her album-opener, "Both Hands." DiFranco righteously and beautifully explores the sense of loss that comes with the end of a relationship. When she sings "I am walking / Out in the rain / And I am listening to the low moan / Of the dial tone again / And I am getting / Nowhere with you / And I can't let it go / And I can't get through . . . Now use both hands / Oh, no don't close your eyes / I am writing / Graffiti on your body / I am drawing the story of / How hard we tried" ("Both Hands") it is hard for anyone who has ever lost love to not nod their head in agreement and say "yeah, I've been there!" DiFranco gets the sound and emotion right and she phrases the demise of relationships perfectly and sets the listener up for something much better than the rest of the album holds.

Take, for example, "Fire Door." "Fire Door" is much like the rest of the songs on "Ani DiFranco," a musical storysong that seems to be deeply personal and is at its very worst interesting and different from what most musical artists put out on the radio. But her stories are more esoteric than universal when she writes lines like "You know, taken out of context I must / Seem so strange / Killed a cockroach so big / It left a puddle of pus on the wall / When you and I are lying in bed / You don't seem so tall / I'm singing now because my tear ducts are too tired / And my brain is disconnected but my heart is wired" ("Fire Door"). Much of the music on Ani DiFranco seems autobiographical (she references herself directly in the second song) and that robs the album some of any pretense of a universal quality.

Still, there is just enough in the universal melancholy quality of songs like "Out Of Habit" to recommend potential listeners read the writing of Ani DiFranco. And on "Letting The Telephone Ring," she makes the personal universal when she sings "I am letting the telephone ring / 'Cause I don't want to know why / I don't want to hear you explain / I don't want to hear you cry" and it works beautifully. If only it were sung in a way that was remotely musical!

Ultimately, that is the undoing of Ani DiFranco. She sounds like a coffee house standard and in many ways she is. On Ani DiFranco, she could be any number of poets at open mike night or any number of women who put out a demo tape. The problem for her is that outside the strength of some of her lyrics, she could be anyone and it is hard to care about her specifically or this endeavor as a result.

The best song is "Both Hands," the low point is the thoroughly unmemorable "Every Angle."

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Not So Soft
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip
Little Plastic Castle

5/10

For other music reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!

© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.

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Ani DiFranco Manages To Not Bug Me With Little Plastic Castle

The Good: Musically diverse, Decent lyrics/concepts, Vocally diverse
The Bad: Feels short(final track is excessively long and pads out album),Trying too hard to be different
The Basics: Good enough to recommend, Little Plastic Castle presents Ani DiFranco making actual music with a strong sense of politics that works!


So, it has finally happened; I found an Ani DiFranco album I would actually recommend! How about that? When I named Ani DiFranco my female Artist Of The Month, no doubt I anticipated liking her works quite a bit more than I have been. However, thus far, I have found myself underwhelmed with the albums of hers that I have heard. Ani DiFranco is hardly as creative, audacious or - and this seems to be my biggest beef thus far - musically competent as many people have tried to sell her to me as.

Then I put Little Plastic Castle on high rotation here at the homestead and . . . I discovered I was not hating it. In fact, there were a few songs I enjoyed and generally, the album was cool and pleasant enough to not pan. That said, Little Plastic Castle is not an extraordinary album and while I did not hate it, I also am not rushing out to buy it. Still, there is enough to recommend it and it is generally enjoyable pop-rock music from a strong female vocalist.

With a dozen songs occupying 61:25, Little Plastic Castle is distinctly the work of Ani DiFranco. DiFranco wrote all of the songs and she produced and co-mixed the album as well. As always she provided all of the lead vocals and she plays multiple instruments as well. On this album, she plays multiple guitars (tenor, acoustic, baritone, and electric), keyboards, bass pedals, drums and percussion and a concertina. In other words, this is inarguably the musical vision of Ani DiFranco.

I have come to the point in my immersion in the works of Ani DiFranco where I believe I have come to understand her popularity, especially among angsty young women; DiFranco says what no other musical artist seems to get around to saying, certainly none of the mainstream ones. While I enjoyed Little Plastic Castle more than any other Ani DiFranco album I've yet heard of hers, I still come around, ultimately, to the idea that it is likely her lyrics more than anything else that is selling her album. That said, on this album, DiFranco at least has more enthusiasm and pep than on many of her other albums.

Indeed, Little Plastic Castle is richly produced, adding a depth of sound to DiFranco's vocals and lyrics that enhances the overall album. DiFranco sounds on this album like a studio-produced vocalist who could be mainstream, were it not for her lyrics. Indeed, on "Deep Dish," she sounds almost exactly like Susanne Vega. The style is more jazz-based, exciting and actually melodic. Nowhere on Little Plastic Castle does DiFranco sound like the coffeehouse "one woman and a guitar" chick. No, here she sounds remarkably mainstream.

Vocally, DiFranco is more developed, carrying a tune on virtually every song. While she singspeaks through songs like "Deep Dish" and "Fuel," the latter arguably just to articulate her long, complex lines, she actually sings and puts the sound of her voice out as an instrument on songs like "Pixie," "Pulse," and on moments of the album's title track.

Instrumentally, DiFranco presents herself as a strong woman with a guitar and keyboards. More than most of her other albums, the percussion section lets loose and she does a pretty amazing job of creating tunes. Most of the sound of the album is upbeat, energetic with a pop-rock feel that sounds much more mainstream than her early folk-rock works. "Loom," for example, sounds like it could be an early Melissa Etheridge track or even something being released nowadays by an American Idol contestant.

That said, it is still the lyrics that do seem to bring people to the works of Ani DiFranco and on this album she is a social commentator more than a relationship counselor. Deeply political, she explores the way media conglomeration affects the U.S., albeit in somewhat cliche terms like "And I wonder who's gonna be president, tweedle dum or tweedle dummer? / And who's gonna have the big blockbuster box office this summer? / How about we put up a wall between houses and the highway / And you can go your way, and I can go my may / Except all the radios agree with all the tvs / And all the magazines agree with all the radios / And I keep hearing that same damn song everywhere I go" ("Fuel"). She makes good observations and DiFranco sings truth to power in an uncommon way.

Frequently, Ani DiFranco rails against capitalism. She does it fairly effectively on "Pixie." There, she melodically decries the status quo when she sings "Maybe you don't like your job / Maybe you didn't get enough sleep / Well, nobody likes their job / Nobody got enough sleep / Maybe you just had / The worst day of your life / But, you know, there's no escape / And there's no excuse / So just suck up and be nice" ("Pixie"). This is precisely the kind of social statement mainstream artists who are tied to big record labels do not sing about. That DiFranco can actually make such sentiments musical is impressive!

DiFranco is also more sexual in some of her lyrics - in a classy way - than many artists on the market today. She mixes the political and relationships when she wrote the lines on "Independence Day," ". . . The birds flew around like the whole world was ending / And I don't think war is noble / And I don't like to think that love is like war / And I gotta big hot cherry bomb, and I want to slip it through the mail slot / Of your front door." DiFranco has decent diction and it is clear she has something to day. To her credit, she is an original.

On Little Plastic Castle, it is that originality that is worth lauding and worth the attention of the listener. She presents it all articulately and musically and creates a pop-rock sound that might sound more mainstream, but a message that is not (yet) what we would consider anything other than alternative.

The best track is "Deep Dish," the low point is the unmemorable "Swan Dive."

For other Ani DiFranco works, please check out my reviews of:
Not So Soft
Not A Pretty Girl
Living In Clip

6/10

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© 2011, 2009 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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