Three times a lady
IT SHOULDN’T, of course, be an issue – that these three musicians all happen to be female. Yet the very fact that each has created such a dazzling body of work on her own terms in a maledominated medium is brilliant in and of itself. So, Neko Case, kd lang and Laura Veirs writing and recording together feels rare and special. There’s not a spot of showboating to be found in its understated, gorgeous songs; its creators had enough self-confidence and delight in the project to simply enjoy the process. case/lang/veirs came into being when lang sent an email to Case and Veirs saying they should make a record: “There was no question,” Case said, of their immediate, affirmative responses. Tonally, the record is a balancing act, its songs at once poised and powerful, the arrangements both pristine and warmblooded (thanks in no small part to Veirs’ husband, producer Tucker Martine). case/ lang/veirs is a mature record; the singers’ voices are rich and golden, and its subject matter is a poignant testament to lives in the process of being well-lived. Accordingly, Down I-5 has Case driving the Pacific Coast highway and musing on William Blake’s Songs Of Innocence And Experience: “Some are born to sweet delight, some are born to endless night,” she recites, adding crisply, “I’ve tasted both, they are the same.” For all its grace and subtlety, this is a vigorous, life-affirming record. Veirs’ spry, delicate turn on Greens Of June finds her drawn out of an inner darkness by the fullness of summer’s colours: “They make me want to live like I never have before.” Songs like these seem to exist simply for their own pleasure,
Three powerful, singular voices come together for impressive joint enterprise. By Sophie Harris.
like spring daffodils at a stream. As on each artist’s solo work, there’s no trace of self pity or mawkishness; the torch song Blue Fires is among kd lang’s most affecting moments, her exquisite, lush vocal backed by quiet arrangements which only break for a reverberant, clanging guitar solo. That this record was a joy to make is evident in the album’s poppier moments, notably Veirs’ Best Kept Secret and Case’s rollicking Delirium. The record’s sweet, deep heartbeat, though, is in the song I Want To Be Here. Sunny, like The Beatles’ Here, There And Everywhere and sparkling like Emmylou Harris’s Hard Times, it’s a note of support to a struggling artist friend. The song is simultaneously tender and defiant, and all three women come together to sing its chorus: “I wanna be here with you, not bracing for what comes next… If there’s a limit, it hasn’t found me yet.”