Rating:
Genre:
Vocal Music
Release Date: 09/14/2004
Why it took vocalist
Madeleine Peyroux eight years to follow up her acclaimed
Dreamland album is anybody's guess. The explanation from her website bio claims, "I could have kept running with it, but I took a breather." Really it hardly matters, since there have been plenty of capable singers to fill that void. Produced by
Larry Klein,
Careless Love is essentially
Dreamland part deux. She lost
Yves Beauvais and
Atlantic Records, as well as a stellar cast of edgy
jazz and
rock session players, but she did gain
Larry Klein. There are some fine players on this album, including
Larry Goldings,
Scott Amendola,
David Piltch, and
Dean Parks, and it's a much more focused set than
Dreamland. That she's on
Rounder is just an "oh well." Since
Klein is not reined in by having to be a "
jazz" producer, his sense of restrained and subtle adventure is a perfect foil for
Peyroux's voice and phrasing, which is still too close to the
Billie Holiday model for comfort. The material is a curious collection of modern
pop songs,
country tunes, and old nuggets. There's an original as well in
"Don't Wait Too Long," co-written with
Jesse Harris and
Klein.
Peyroux's reading of
Leonard Cohen's
"Dance Me to the End of Love" that opens the disc is radical, sung like a German
cabaret song, and lacks the drama of the original, which is on purpose but it's questionable as to whether it works.
Her cover of
Bob Dylan's
"You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go" works much better. It keeps the breeziness of the original but focuses on the object of the song still being very present to the protagonist -- delighting in the presence of the Beloved.
Parks' guitars play sparely and pronouncedly in the mix, as
Amendola's brushwork complements the spare cymbal and tom-tom work of
Jay Bellerose as well as
Goldings' in-the-groove organ and piano. The hinge track on this record is the empathic and moving version of
Elliott Smith's
"Between the Bars." With tense sound effects whispering in the backdrop and
Goldings' celeste setting the atmosphere, once again
Amendola's brushes whisper and shimmer, giving the singer an anchor in the depth of the song's melancholy. It's simply awesome. The sparse haunted treatment of
Hank Williams'
"Weary Blues" is devoid of its
country trappings and rooted firmly in the uptown
blues tradition of
Holiday's 1940s. Likewise, the title track, a classic
standard by
W.C. Handy, is turned inside out and made a B sharp
gospel-flavored
R&B tune, driven by
Goldings on the organ and a Rhodes piano -- an instrument that makes a frequent appearance here.
Parks' subtle yet dirty guitar gives the singer a platform and she swims inside the lyric, letting it fall from her mouth. The tune's swing quotient is formidable. In all, this is a stronger record than
Dreamland, in part because
Klein is obviously sympathetic to singers and because
Peyroux is a more confident and commanding singer. It's a welcome addition to the shelf, but if she waits another eight years, that space reserved for her may disappear.
~Thom Jurek, All Music Guide
;)
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