Album Review - Ys by Joanna Newsom
She’s back!
Joanna Newsom is a hippie harp player from San Francisco who has a voice like a witchy child and plays with words like a cat plays with a half dead mouse. She has just released her second album on Drag City. Her first album ‘The Milk Eyed Mender’ was full of quirky pop songs about snails and eating dinner. This album is still very playful, but it also sounds far more grown up. The songs are much longer, have no choruses and develop like short novellas that I just keep coming back to. It’s all built around her wonderful beguiling voice, cryptic lyrics and plucky harp playing. The production is really rich and colourful. I love Van Dyke Park’s over the top string arrangements.
People compare her quirkiness to Bjork and Kate Bush, but she is a one off and special in her own terms. This album has so much gusto, orginality and feeling that you can’t help but fall in love with her and declare this as one of the classics of the year.