I haven't had the pleasure of listening to Jolie Holland's entire new album "Springtime Can Kill You," but every song I have heard sounds as though it could have been plunked anywhere onto her sophomore release "Escondita" and would fit marvelously.
"Escondita" came out in 2004 and still, I rarely put it back in its case. Instead I plop it upside-down on the CD player because I know it won't be long before I'll be reloading it to listen.
"Escondita" has been that way for me ever since I bought it. Yes, I bought it. I rarely by CDs anymore, instead hunt for their slightly more inexpensive vinyl counterparts. But I couldn't afford not to buy "Escondita".
Like "Escondita", "Springtime Can Kill You" is off of the Anti label, keeping good company with Elliott Smith, Tom Waits, The Frames; that Irish folk-rock band I was introduced to while living across the pond, and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds; another band whose music I met in my travels. (Knowing the music of Nick Cave deserves an entire blog in and of itself. It was shown to me by my former boss in Bangkok, a New Zealand bloag who ate enough fruit cake and smoked enough cigarettes to give himself diabetes (that's his diagnosis, not mine). His wife had died ten years ago and still he sat at open mics, shoes off, legs crossed, crooning Nick Cave's music, intermixed with his own, through the gap in his one tooth. The songs cronicled death, loss, suicide, overdoses, and more death. He was quite the jolly chap. Apparently he was friends with the Bad Seeds. Somewhere along the way they had a falling out... this is where the story gets a bit fuzzy, I think in part due to the fact that I was intentionally left out of this classy conversation. So I'll leave this open for a possible future blog....ehem...Eric).
But I seriously digress.
Jolie Holland.
Jangly guitars, drunken trumpets, saloon pianos, lyrical elixers, rail-side drum brushes, and her voice, tainted with the sweet scent of cordials. It really sounds like she's been sitting around sipping cordials. I'd like to sip cordials with Jolie Holland. And I think you should too.
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