My Brightest Diamond : All Things Will Unwind

<img src="http://www.qromag.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/mybrightestdiamondallthings.jpg" alt="My Brightest Diamond : All Things Will Unwind" /><br /> <span style="font-style: normal">It's high time to hear back from indie-classical leading lady light, My Brightest Diamond. </span>...
My Brightest Diamond : All Things Will Unwind
7.5 Asthmatic Kitty
2011 

My Brightest Diamond : All Things Will Unwind It’s been a good year for indie-classical women.  Feist (QRO live review) has triumphantly returned with Metals (QRO review), her follow-up to 2008’s breakthrough The Reminder (QRO review).  St. Vincent (QRO spotlight on) is just getting bigger & bigger, out now with her third record, Strange Mercy (QRO review).  And indie-classical superstars The National (QRO spotlight on) are always looking for a new guest female vocalist, the surest way to fame since Broken Social Scene (QRO spotlight on) started recruiting lady guests (like Feist…).  So it’s high time to hear back from Shara Worden – a.k.a. My Brightest Diamond – on her new All Things Will Unwind.

After the more rock-oriented Bring Me the Workhorse in 2006, Worden went significantly indie-classical on 2008’s A Thousand Shark’s Teeth (QRO review), and Unwind goes even further.In addition to string quartets, there’s a healthy amount of woodwinds, giving a nature sound to such pieces as “Reaching Through To the Other Side” and “In the Beginning”, while the percussion is high (in tone) on “Ding Dang” and hollow (in instrument) on “Everything Is In Line”.This is decidedly an indie-classical record: those looking for guitars are outta luck.

But Worden’s main focus, and main strength, is in her considerable voice.  Like Active Child (QRO album review) or Antony & The Johnsons (but without the gender-bending oddity of near-choirboy-ness), Worden channels hymnals through a modern, alt-diva angle – perhaps the best analogy is Björk (QRO album review).  Worden ranges from the high falsetto of “We Added It Up” and quiet “She Does Not Brave the War” to the jazz-diva of the slower & darker “Be Brave” or up-tempo “High Low Middle” & spry “There’s a Rat”.

My Brightest Diamond is still something of an acquired taste, not as easily accessible as the likes of Feist, St. Vincent, The National, or even labelmate Sufjan Stevens (QRO live review), on whose excellent Illinois Worden contributed.  But the lady is a leading light in the indie-classical movement.

MP3 Stream: “There’s a Rat

{audio}/mp3/files/My Brightest Diamond – Theres a Rat.mp3{/audio}

 

Categories
Album Reviews
  • Anonymous
    at
  • No Comment

    Leave a Reply

    Album of the Week