4/5
St. Vincent's Day.
Scream if you wanna go faster. One week after the 'Tortured Poets Department' of Taylor Swift released (arguably) the album of the year, we get a new record from one of America's most accomplished artists across the independent world. Not to mention in a year of women in music like Haim's 2020. From the 'Visions' of Norah Jones, to not forgetting about Maggie Rogers this month, too. Or grand and great genre left turns like the spurs of 'Cowboy Carter' Beyoncé going for that country Grammy. But Annie Erin Clark, AKA St. Vincent is the queen of genre bending like a Prince. And now just a couple of calendars after daddy was home for the blonde on blonde concept classic based on a true story from her family's youth, Vincent is back with her best since 'Masseduction'. A seductive education to pop like 'Pills' that was 2017's big-three best in the same fall of the 'Colors' of Beck and LCD Soundsystem's 'American Dream'. Starting at the end with the birth of 'All Born Screaming's' title track and a classic collaboration closer with Cate Le Bon, Annie is on fire...literally. But she's OK, MJ on weird and wonderful amazing album artwork for this divine number of a seventh seal from Total Pleasure and Virgin. Aflame in the Compound Fracture of Los Angeles, or the Electric studios of Chicago (Audio) and New York (Lady). Industrial prog rock and art pop at its absolute f#####g finest.
Ignited by the brilliant 'Broken Man', red-hot 'Flea' and the scorching 'Big Time Nothing's single, the first record since this Saint's soundtrack for her directorial debut on the silver screen 'The Nowhere Inn' is a classic in the making of this '24 year. Meaningful like letter in the alphabet, hours in the day, or Kobe. This "sonic vocabulary" that features amazing artist's like Dave Grohl of the Foo Fighters growls like "walking in the woods". It's a rave of depression and anxiety bubbling to the surface, influenced by the 90s dance culture that was The Prodigy of twisted firestarters like the late, great Keith Flint and them. This rocks like the 'Reckless' favourite that abandons all you thought you knew from this sonic hedge better. It's just like Clark told The Guardian, she'd rather have people scratching their heads than covering their mouths to yawn. The brilliant and bracing brimstone of 'Hell Is Near' opens this inferno's proceedings like Dante before some big numbers and 'Violent Times' reminds us, "I forgot people could be so kind/In these violent times/Dollar signs/Almost lost it chasing dollar signs/Knew the cost but I forgot the price/Of buying my life." For what it's worth, that's something we all need to remember in this modern day maddening malaise that has kept us lost in an artificial algorithm of a numbing negativity that fails to see the light in other individuals that don't muddle in with the masses that seduce us with an alternative education. Time to go back to songwriting school for all it's worth.
There's no artist like Annie Clark. St. Vincent is out of this world, like 'So Many Planets'. Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune and Pluto. But there's no easy method here as Vincent keeps the progression rocking for her art, all the way until 'The Powers Out' and she sings "Monday morning, subway station/Pushers pushing, racers racing/Came the message on the station/"The power's out across the nation"/And, "Ladies and gentlemen it seems we've got a problem"/The man on my screen said, just as somebody shot him/And the mothers gasped, the children cried/Almost could not believe my eyes" to the club lights come on like a faucet. A New York blackout like no other witnessed by the city on record, like a Vampire Weekend eclipse or the aeroplane moment where 'Only God Was Above Us'. But it's the 'Sweetest Fruit' of a sobering and sombre tribute to late music producer Sophie that will really start with you after the streams and CDs end. Sophie Xeon passed accidentally in 2021, falling after trying to get the perfect picture of a full moon. And with this tribute, Annie makes sure Sophie's name belongs in the stars, in full, forever. "My Sophie climbed the roof/To get a better view of the moon/Moon/My God, then one wrong step/Took her down to the depths/But for a minute, what a view/What a view." And what a way to pay tribute. These days we'll risk it all to behold the beauty of a world where so much is unfortunately ugly. But when it comes to all that we should hold close and as near as dear. You're listening to it right here. Mommy's home. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Playlist Picks: 'Reckless', 'Broken Man', 'All Born Screaming (Feat. Cate Le Bon)'.
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