Neko Case – Middle Cyclone
Well, I really was feeling wary about this, because the pre-release promo track People Got a Lotta Nerve really didn’t do it for me. It was sort of stodgy, by the numbers alt-country and I ended up feeling rather apprehensive about the rest of the album. I am a bit of a neophyte as far as Neko Case is concerned, with Fox Confessor being the first album of hers which I bought, and my knowledge of her previous releases still being more than a little sketchy.
Fox Confessor, for me, was a bit of a masterpiece and do I think this is quite as good? Well, no, but I doubt I was ever going to. When you first properly discover an artist by virtue of their writing one of your favourite albums in years then not much they can do is likely to live up to that. What it does not do, however, is disappoint.
Neko Case’s music, if it has a fault, can occasionally flirt with the alt-country version of power pop. On this album it does threaten to happen from time to time, but she always seems to shift just before things go a little too far. The vocals have a similar sort of tendency. She has tremendous vocal power and a voice that is clean as a whistle. In terms of sheer vocal ability she seems to me (although I wouldn’t know) to have one of the strongest voices in indie music at the moment.
Because of these factors, it is the restraint that I find remarkable in her music. It would be so easy for her to overdo it, but she never seems to. You get the impression of someone totally in control of her music.
The final word as far as Neko Case is concerned is, I think, warmth. Despite combative and occasionally confrontational lyrics, she mixes in some wonderfully lovelorn ones and delivers it all with a kind of welcoming, friendly intimacy which is perhaps, in the absence of much quirkiness, where the rich charisma of her music comes from. So I may never love this as much as Fox Confessor, but it’s a bloody lovely record. Again. She’s good.
Neko Case – This Tornado Loves You
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As an aside, one thing the warmth of her voice falls slightly short in achieving is the ragged pain of this Harry Nilsson song. The Walkmen recorded an absolutely stunning version a few years back, and the bewildered, raw hurt of Hamilton Leithauser’s voice suits this particular track much better, I think. Or maybe I’m just saying that because theirs is the first version I heard.
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I like Neko Case.
i like this also…….
….Hey Toad….you know music can be ok and still be really liked…doesn’t have to be a knock me down reinventing the wheel classic all the time.
Do you, Bart? That’s nice.
Chutters, I know, and you’re right. I’m just suffering from a slight hangover caused by one of my favourite albums, that’s all.
I don’t know what it is, but for some reason I’m having trouble generating any enthusiasm for Neko Case. I find that she sings mostly through her nose. I really enjoyed her work on Mass Romantic by the New Pornographers, though, but I think that was mostly because there’s a sweetness in A.C. Newman’s voice that offsets what I dislike about Nasal Neko’s.
nasal? i don’t see anything nasal about her voice at all. it’s deep and echo-y and if anything, throaty, not nasal. definitely recalls country great patsy cline. i can see maybe not having a taste for it, but i think she has one of the most moving voices since nina simone, and she can definitely hit those notes!
I’d agree with you. I don’t see the nasal thing either – if anything I’d say she had one of the cleanest, most straighforwardly accomplished voices in music today. Not that her voice doesn’t have character, of course.
Yes, I suppose I was being unfair. Upon further review, she’s not nasal. I still don’t like it, though. Why not? I want to like it. Everyone else seems to, and they look like they’re having such fun.
Sorry mate, sometimes it just happens. There must be something wrong with you.