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Equally grounded in '50s country and contemporary punk, folk, electronica,
alt-country, and jazz, Neko Case's first studio album in four
years, Fox Confessor Brings The Flood, is a poetic collection
of tales of the downtrodden and the desperate, the heartbroken and
the lonely. Recorded with the help of The Sadies, Jon Rauhaus,
Joey Burns and John Convertino of Calexico, Howe
Gelb, The Band's Garth Hudson, and Case's frequent
on-stage guest Kelly Hogan, Fox Confessor Brings The Flood
captures moments in time, fragments of life that serve as turning
points for her characters. As is expected in country music, Case's
characters usually find their lives changing for the worse, and yet
Case manages somehow to imbue the album with hope, making Fox Confessor
Brings The Flood both uplifting and melancholy, rollicking and
ominous.
The opening track, "Margaret Vs. Pauline," is the tale
of two women beholden to the circumstances of life and birth set
to a lilting folk-pop melody. The comparison between the two women
is best summed up by the song's closing lines "two girls ride
the blue line/two girls walk down the same street/one left her sweater
sittin' on the train/the other lost three fingers at the cannery/everything's
so easy for Pauline." Filled with jazzy brush drums and resonating
guitar, the following track, "Star Witness," immortalizes
the moment in which a woman loses her lover when his '69 Falcon
plunges off a treacherous stretch of highway. Here Case's brassy
contralto is at its most beautiful, most pleading, most rugged when
she croons, "my nightgown sweeps the pavement, please/don't
let him die/oh how I forgot..." The poetry of Case's lyrics
becomes apparent in the details she includes in each song - from
the image of Pauline's hair of "cinnamon waves" and Margaret's
"parking lot eyes" to the opening lines of "Star
Witness" in which she sings "my true love drowned in a
dirty old pan/of oil that did run from the block/of a falcon sedan
1969/the paper said '75."
The tempo and foreboding feel pick up with "Hold On, Hold On,"
Case's most autobiographical song on Fox Confessor Brings The Flood.
"The most tender place in my heart is for strangers/I know it's
unkind but my own blood is much too dangerous," she belts out
over a haunting reverberating guitar intro. "Hold On, Hold On"
is the cynical tale of a woman who has given up on love and found
that fate makes promises it fails to keep. "That Teenage Feeling"
is an equally enigmatic musical affair. Comprised of a harpsichord
intro, twangy guitars that fade in and out, and a sing-along punk-infused
refrain, "That Teenage Feeling" is a jaded love song in
which Case quietly inquires "Did they fill me with so many secrets
that keep me from loving you?" The title track has a far more
ominous feel than either "Hold On, Hold On" or "That
Teenage Feeling." Grounded in the Ukrainian fables Case's grandmother
once told her, "Fox Confessor Brings The Flood" is a three-minute
country-rock lament that finds Case's protagonist question faith and
her own fate. "Who married me to these orphan blues?" she
asks over echoing baritone guitar and stuttering brush drums reminiscent
of the title track of 2002's Blacklisted.
"John Saw That Number" finds Case harkening back to a different
folk tradition - that of American Gospel music. With traditional lyrics
and music written by Case, "John Saw That Number" begins
with Case and Kelly Hogan singing a capella, before building into
a driving rock rhythm complimented by Garth Hudson's delicate piano
and organ touches. "Dirty Knife," by contrast, has the feel
of Case's earlier murder ballad, "Furnace Room Lullaby,"
with ominous cello and foreboding bowed bass courtesy of Calexico's
Joey Burns and aching soprano backing vocals from the aforementioned
Ms. Hogan. Inspired by the story Case's grandmother once told her
of a family who went mad in the Washington wilderness (a malady which
Case attributed to possible lead poisoning), "Dirty Knife"
ends with Case and Hogan's haunting vocalizations in Bulgarian to
convey the lead character's descent into madness.
The true highlight of Fox Confessor Brings the Flood, however, does
not come until ten tracks in with the morose, folk-inspired "Maybe
Sparrow." Beginning with faint guitar strums and foreboding cello,
"Maybe Sparrow" builds to a crescendo, culminating in the
punk-infused gunfire drums and guitar, before falling quiet and building
once again to a mid-range tempo. Case's voice perfectly accents each
change in tempo - an aching lilt at the beginning, becoming a tenacious
growl as the tempo builds, ascending and descending in tone with each
change in the music - as she warns the precious sparrow of the dangers
she may find in the world. "Maybe sparrow you should wait/the
hawk's alight till morning," she croons at the outset. The album's
closer, "The Needle Touched Down," runs a close second to
"Maybe Sparrow" as the high point of Fox Confessor Brings
The Flood. The musical equivalent of a midnight drive on a deserted,
rural highway, "The Needle Touched Down" features a driving,
yet intricate, rhythm, a lilting keyboard and guitar melody, quiet
mandolin touches, and a soaring cello refrain. Lyrically, "The
Needle Touched Down" is the story of lost love, poverty, and
regrets set in Case's hometown, Spanaway, Washington, featuring the
upbeat, immortal rock 'n roll line, "the needle has landed/let
it play" as well as images of "semi-trailers," Greyhound
buses, and "sharp-toothed freighters" - making the song
at once resigned and strangely hopeful.
Fox Confessor Brings The Flood is a masterpiece of poetic
lyrics and catchy, intricate melodies, of sublime musicianship and
risk-taking musical experimentation, that defies categorization. Case's
lyrics are full of extraordinary images and the complexities of human
emotions, yet they have a thematic universality that allows all listeners
to relate. Her music is at once joyous and sinister, often running
the gamut within mere seconds. For those who thought Blacklisted
would be Neko Case's immortal musical and lyrical treasure...think
again.
-Tracy M. Rogers
Track List:
1. Margaret Vs. Pauline
2. Star Witness
3. Hold On, Hold On
4. Widow's Toast
5. That Teenage Feeling
6. Fox Confessor Brings the Flood
7. John Saw That Number
8. Dirty Knife
9. Lion's Jaws
10. Maybe Sparrow
11. At Last
12. The Needle Has Landed
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