| Angel Olsen — My Woman (September 2nd, 2016) |
Angel Olsen — My Woman (September 2nd, 2016)
Born: January 22, 1987
Instruments: Vocals, guitar
Description:
♦» Anyone reckless enough to have typecast Angel Olsen according to 2013’s “Burn Your Fire For No Witness” is in for a sizable surprise with her third album, MY WOMAN. The crunchier, blown–out production of the former is gone, but that fire is now burning wilder. Her disarming, timeless voice is even more front–and–centre than before, and the overall production is lighter. Yet the strange, raw power and slowly unspooling incantations of her previous efforts remain, so anyone who might attempt to pigeonhole Olsen as either an elliptical outsider or a pop personality is going to be wrong whichever way they choose — Olsen continues to reign over the land between the two with a haunting obliqueness and sophisticated grace. 
© Angel Olsen at Glasslands
♦» Given its title, and track names like ‘Sister’ and ‘Woman’, it would be easy to read a gender–specific message into MY WOMAN, but Olsen has never played her lyrical content straight. She explains: “I’m definitely using scenes that I’ve replayed in my head, in the same way that I might write a script and manipulate a memory to get it to fit. But I think it’s important that people can interpret things the way that they want to.”
♦» That said, Olsen concedes that if she could locate any theme, whether in the funny, synth–laden ‘Intern’ or the sadder songs which are collected on the record’s latter half, “then it’s maybe the complicated mess of being a woman and wanting to stand up for yourself, while also knowing that there are things you are expected ...”
♦» Over her two previous albums, she’s given us reverb–shrouded poetic swoons, shadowy folk, grunge–pop band workouts and haunting, finger–picked epics. MY WOMAN is an exhilarating complement to her past work, and one for which Olsen recalibrated her writing/recording approach and methods to enter a new music–making phase. She wrote some songs on the piano she’d bought at the end of the previous album tour, but she later switched it out for synth and/or Mellotron on a few of them, such as the aforementioned ‘Intern’.
© Angel Olsen, Gibson guitar
♦» MY WOMAN is lovingly put together as a proper A–side and a B–side, featuring the punchier, more pop/rock–oriented songs up front, and the longer, more reflective tracks towards the end. The rollicking ‘Shut Up Kiss Me’, for example, appears early on — its nervy grunge quality belying a subtle desperation, as befits any song about the exhaustion point of an impassioned argument. Another crowning moment comes in the form of the melancholic and Velvets–esque ‘Heart–shaped Face’, while the compelling ‘Sister’ and ‘Woman’ are the only songs not sung live. They also both run well over the seven–minute mark: the first being a triumph of reverb–splashed, ‘70s country rock, cast along Fleetwood Mac lines with a Neil Young caged–tiger guitar solo to cap it off. The latter is a wonderful essay in vintage electronic pop and languid, psychedelic soul.
♦» Because her new songs demanded a plurality of voices, Olsen sings in a much broader range of styles on the album, and she brought in guest guitarist Seth Kauffman to augment her regular band of bass player Emily Elhaj, drummer Joshua Jaeger and guitarist Stewart Bronaugh. As for a producer, Olsen took to Justin Raisen, who’s known for his work with Charli XCX, Sky Ferreira and Santigold, as well as opting to record live to tape at LA’s historic Vox Studios.
♦» As the record evolves, you get the sense that the “My Woman” of the title is Olsen herself — absolutely in command, but also willing to bend with the influence of collaborators and circumstances. If ever there was any pressure in the recording process, it’s totally undetectable in the result. An intuitively smart, warmly communicative and fearlessly generous record, MY WOMAN speaks to everyone. That it might confound expectation is just another of its strengths.
Label: http://jagjaguwar.com/
Website: http://www.angelolsen.com/#/my-woman
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9p8x80IJBj251fDyGENdgA
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AngelOlsen
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/angelolsenmusic
ALBUMS:
As leader:
♦» Summer Bummer Get Laid Get Wasted (Compilation Cassette, only one song included entitled “Your Train, My Home”), October 2009, Bathetic Records.
♦» Strange Cacti (Debut Cassette), July 2010, Bathetic Records.
♦» Lady Of The Waterpark (Covers Cassette), September 2010, Love Lion Records.
♦» Electric Temple’s Ceremony for Japan (Compilation Cassette, only one song included, a Townes Van Zandt cover called “She Came and She Touched Me”), April 2011, Electric Temple Records.
♦» Strange Cacti (LP edition) April 2011, Bathetic Records.
♦» Half Way Home (LP edition) Sept 2012, Bathetic Records.
♦» Sleepwalker (7”, “Sweet Dreams”/“California”) January 2013, Sixteen Tambourines.
♦» Burn Your Fire for No Witness (CD/LP/Cassette) February 2014, Jagjaguwar (for cd/lp) and Bathetic (limited cassette pressing)
♦» Intern (Single) June 2016, Jagjaguwar.
♦» My Woman September 2016, Jagjaguwar. ♠ ANGEL OLSEN …grew up in St. Louis… lives in Chicago… sings songs…
♠ …eats sandwiches (in the morning)… trips.
♠ Waiting is a theme not only on the aforementioned eponymous track, but also “Can’t Wait Until Tomorrow.” So there’s something on Half Way Home about spaces inbetween:
• neither origin nor destination
• womb and birth, to not–quite–childhood
• kinda–requited love
• ignorance and knowledge (producing wisdom?)
• the everyday destruction of the world, and
• the view of death from life.
♠ “Olsen’s vocal technique is unorthodox, guttural, nearly feral at times. She has evidently never had a singing lesson, and that’s not a complaint, because her wildness is utterly compelling.” — Jennifer Kelly
♠ Raised in St. Louis and relocated to Chicago, this indie folk singer/songwriter worked with the Cairo Gang and Will Oldham before striking out solo.
Born & raised: in St. Louis, Missouri
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Album release: September 2nd, 2016
Record Label: Jagjaguwar
Duration: 47:26
Tracks:
01. Intern 2:46
02. Never Be Mine 3:40
03. Shut Up Kiss Me 3:21
04. Give It Up 2:55
05. Not Gonna Kill You 4:56
06. Heart Shaped Face 5:32
07. Sister 7:45
08. Those Were The Days 4:17
09. Woman 7:33
10. Pops 4:41 
♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»♦»
| Angel Olsen — My Woman (September 2nd, 2016) |
Instruments: Vocals, guitar
Description:
♦» Anyone reckless enough to have typecast Angel Olsen according to 2013’s “Burn Your Fire For No Witness” is in for a sizable surprise with her third album, MY WOMAN. The crunchier, blown–out production of the former is gone, but that fire is now burning wilder. Her disarming, timeless voice is even more front–and–centre than before, and the overall production is lighter. Yet the strange, raw power and slowly unspooling incantations of her previous efforts remain, so anyone who might attempt to pigeonhole Olsen as either an elliptical outsider or a pop personality is going to be wrong whichever way they choose — Olsen continues to reign over the land between the two with a haunting obliqueness and sophisticated grace.
♦» Given its title, and track names like ‘Sister’ and ‘Woman’, it would be easy to read a gender–specific message into MY WOMAN, but Olsen has never played her lyrical content straight. She explains: “I’m definitely using scenes that I’ve replayed in my head, in the same way that I might write a script and manipulate a memory to get it to fit. But I think it’s important that people can interpret things the way that they want to.”
♦» That said, Olsen concedes that if she could locate any theme, whether in the funny, synth–laden ‘Intern’ or the sadder songs which are collected on the record’s latter half, “then it’s maybe the complicated mess of being a woman and wanting to stand up for yourself, while also knowing that there are things you are expected ...”
♦» Over her two previous albums, she’s given us reverb–shrouded poetic swoons, shadowy folk, grunge–pop band workouts and haunting, finger–picked epics. MY WOMAN is an exhilarating complement to her past work, and one for which Olsen recalibrated her writing/recording approach and methods to enter a new music–making phase. She wrote some songs on the piano she’d bought at the end of the previous album tour, but she later switched it out for synth and/or Mellotron on a few of them, such as the aforementioned ‘Intern’.
♦» MY WOMAN is lovingly put together as a proper A–side and a B–side, featuring the punchier, more pop/rock–oriented songs up front, and the longer, more reflective tracks towards the end. The rollicking ‘Shut Up Kiss Me’, for example, appears early on — its nervy grunge quality belying a subtle desperation, as befits any song about the exhaustion point of an impassioned argument. Another crowning moment comes in the form of the melancholic and Velvets–esque ‘Heart–shaped Face’, while the compelling ‘Sister’ and ‘Woman’ are the only songs not sung live. They also both run well over the seven–minute mark: the first being a triumph of reverb–splashed, ‘70s country rock, cast along Fleetwood Mac lines with a Neil Young caged–tiger guitar solo to cap it off. The latter is a wonderful essay in vintage electronic pop and languid, psychedelic soul.
♦» Because her new songs demanded a plurality of voices, Olsen sings in a much broader range of styles on the album, and she brought in guest guitarist Seth Kauffman to augment her regular band of bass player Emily Elhaj, drummer Joshua Jaeger and guitarist Stewart Bronaugh. As for a producer, Olsen took to Justin Raisen, who’s known for his work with Charli XCX, Sky Ferreira and Santigold, as well as opting to record live to tape at LA’s historic Vox Studios.
♦» As the record evolves, you get the sense that the “My Woman” of the title is Olsen herself — absolutely in command, but also willing to bend with the influence of collaborators and circumstances. If ever there was any pressure in the recording process, it’s totally undetectable in the result. An intuitively smart, warmly communicative and fearlessly generous record, MY WOMAN speaks to everyone. That it might confound expectation is just another of its strengths.
Label: http://jagjaguwar.com/
Website: http://www.angelolsen.com/#/my-woman
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9p8x80IJBj251fDyGENdgA
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AngelOlsen
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/angelolsenmusic
ALBUMS:
As leader:
♦» Summer Bummer Get Laid Get Wasted (Compilation Cassette, only one song included entitled “Your Train, My Home”), October 2009, Bathetic Records.
♦» Strange Cacti (Debut Cassette), July 2010, Bathetic Records.
♦» Lady Of The Waterpark (Covers Cassette), September 2010, Love Lion Records.
♦» Electric Temple’s Ceremony for Japan (Compilation Cassette, only one song included, a Townes Van Zandt cover called “She Came and She Touched Me”), April 2011, Electric Temple Records.
♦» Strange Cacti (LP edition) April 2011, Bathetic Records.
♦» Half Way Home (LP edition) Sept 2012, Bathetic Records.
♦» Sleepwalker (7”, “Sweet Dreams”/“California”) January 2013, Sixteen Tambourines.
♦» Burn Your Fire for No Witness (CD/LP/Cassette) February 2014, Jagjaguwar (for cd/lp) and Bathetic (limited cassette pressing)
♦» Intern (Single) June 2016, Jagjaguwar.
♦» My Woman September 2016, Jagjaguwar. ♠ ANGEL OLSEN …grew up in St. Louis… lives in Chicago… sings songs…
♠ …eats sandwiches (in the morning)… trips.
♠ Waiting is a theme not only on the aforementioned eponymous track, but also “Can’t Wait Until Tomorrow.” So there’s something on Half Way Home about spaces inbetween:
• neither origin nor destination
• womb and birth, to not–quite–childhood
• kinda–requited love
• ignorance and knowledge (producing wisdom?)
• the everyday destruction of the world, and
• the view of death from life.
♠ “Olsen’s vocal technique is unorthodox, guttural, nearly feral at times. She has evidently never had a singing lesson, and that’s not a complaint, because her wildness is utterly compelling.” — Jennifer Kelly
♠ Raised in St. Louis and relocated to Chicago, this indie folk singer/songwriter worked with the Cairo Gang and Will Oldham before striking out solo.
Born & raised: in St. Louis, Missouri
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Album release: September 2nd, 2016
Record Label: Jagjaguwar
Duration: 47:26
Tracks:
01. Intern 2:46
02. Never Be Mine 3:40
03. Shut Up Kiss Me 3:21
04. Give It Up 2:55
05. Not Gonna Kill You 4:56
06. Heart Shaped Face 5:32
07. Sister 7:45
08. Those Were The Days 4:17
09. Woman 7:33
10. Pops 4:41