New Recordings: Tierney Sutton, Haim, Danny Brown
Ratings: **** Excellent, *** Good, ** Fair, * Poor
Tierney Sutton
After Blue
(Varése Sarabande ****)
nolead ends This is easily, instantly, the best Joni Mitchell tribute album ever. Joni will love it. Tierney Sutton, who's singlehandedly demolished categories for her singing (listen to her brazen "On Broadway" from the 2011 CD American Road), took a decade to meditate on Mitchell. The result is an album of rethinkings that's outrageous ("Be Cool"), reverent ("Woodstock"), and unfathomably lovely (the closing "April in Paris/Free Man in Paris" medley). Tunes come from the hallowed Blue and from across the Joni universe, including covers of Joni covers (the Etta Jones classic "Don't Go to Strangers," covered on Mitchell's Both Sides Now). Sutton's not with her incredible band here. Guests include the Turtle Island Quartet and fabulous Hubert Laws on flute. You want "Blue" with just Sutton and a midcentury neoclassical quartet? Here. Want a "Big Yellow Taxi" in 5/4 waltz with just singer and trap set? You got it. Want "All I Want" with just Sutton and Turtle Islander cellist Mark Summer slapping the daylights out of his box? Coming right up. Mitchell's voice is earthy; Sutton's is featherlight-precise, flexible, with enough scatting chops to surprise heck out of you. Not only does After Blue remind you of what a poet and genius Joni Mitchell is - it's also sit-down-and-listen music that, again and again, brings you to your feet.
- John Timpane
nolead begins Haim
nolead ends nolead begins Days Are Gone
nolead ends nolead begins (Columbia ***1/2)
nolead ends The So Cal sister act made up of Danielle, Este, and Alana Haim has nestled in a sweet, sunny corner of pop's flower patch. Their ethereal vocals ride a muscle-car chassis on songs that are familiar enough to embrace and inventive enough to celebrate. The voices, with their sexy mix of immediacy and languor, may remind you of classic pop chanteuses like Stevie Nicks, Chrissie Hynde, and Gloria Estefan. But Haim's hallmark are tracks like "Forever" and "The Wire" that evolve and expand as they go, so the listener starts out somewhere pleasant and gets swept away to somewhere delightful.
- David Hiltbrand
nolead begins Danny Brown
nolead ends nolead begins Old
nolead ends nolead begins (Fool's Gold ***)
nolead ends Danny Brown could have remained rap's dirtiest mind, the imaginary offspring of Redd Foxx and Millie Jackson - if not for Old. Renowned for putting his whining voice, its naughty, nattering flow, and his salacious, misogynist rants through the wringer of steely electro-pop (see XXX for that aesthetic's best reference), Old shows gritty, literate signs of growth beyond Brown's years.
It's not as though Brown never embraced the seriousness of a defensive childhood lived in poverty on previous releases. The "ticked off, desensitized" narrator of "Torture" from Old carries on that tradition. Nor has Brown suddenly given up on the sex/drugs demeanor that made him infamous (check the dippy "Dope Fiend Rental"). Rather, Old places Brown's bad times and worst time in context and finds the rapper pulsing toward a diversity in sound and message. As a party starter, he's got anthems down cold (e.g. "Handstand"). As a technician, he plays to the percussive elements of "Dubstep," like a tap dancer riding a big band's rhythms. Lastly, he makes a great conversationalist (with guest Charli XCX) throughout "Float On," a moody tune where Brown's intent ("Nothing else matters except my next rhyme") rings as boldly as Charles Foster Kane's.
They grow up fast, these kids.
- A.D. Amorosi
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SOURCE: SoundScan (based on purchase data from Philadelphia and Montgomery, Delaware, Bucks, Chester, Camden, Burlington, and Gloucester Counties). Billboard Magazine 10/19/13 © 2013
On Sale Tuesday
Pearl Jam, Lightning Bolt;
Paul McCartney, New;
The Avett Brothers, Magpie and the Dandelion;
Mary J. Blige, A Very Mary Christmas