Now it is time to discuss the sylph-like harpist that is Joanna Newsom. Ms. Newsom’s 2004 debut, The Milk-Eyed Mender was the sort of album that elicited rapturous responses from twee indie boys nationwide, causing anyone with a predilection towards preciousness to drool all over their Belle and Sebastian t-shirts with praise. For example, Dave Eggers in Spin: "This music makes my heart feel stout, and enables me, with my eyes, to breathe fire." Or Ben Gibbard on NPR’s website: "I have fallen in love with her music so deeply over the last three months that I can barely listen to her without being moved to tears."
Now, I like Dave Eggers and Ben Gibbard. They’re good guys, both of whom at one time or another have made my heart feel stout and/or moved me to tears. I should have known better, though, because I bought Milk-Eyed Mender, listened to it twice, and then walked out and tossed it in the river, because I thought that would be a nice place for it to go to die. Like, maybe the album wanted me to toss it in the river, in an Ophelia sort of way. That’s what I got out of it, anyway: "Please, let me just go lie down in a river and die, somehow, without mussing my hair. Do you want the rest of my muffin?"
Newsom is back with a new album, Ys, which I heard a teensy bit of yesterday while hanging out in the office of my new best friend, EW senior editor Rob Brunner. It took me a minute to realize what we were listening to — at first I thought it was a hidden track off the Brigadoon soundtrack — but then I realized only one young lady possesses that specific combo of squeaky voice, antiquated tone, and ability to make my right eye twitch. The new album, as far as I can tell, is less "Throw me in the river" and more "Would you like to go to the ren fair?", but it is no more up my alley than its predecessor. I give up. I cannot stand this music.
What say you, PopWatchers? Am I not being fair to the faerie? Or amI correct in saying that Joanna Newsom is basically Tori Amos for boys?To educate yourself, please read this Q&A (congrats, Pitchfork, on even making the Q&As pretentious!), watch this video, and listen to this track. Then come back and help me figure out why otherwise reasonable human beings find listening to this stuff pleasurable.
(NOTE: The answer, "Because despite being twee indie boys, theystill feel the testosterone-driven need to care for and protectsomething, preferably female and smaller than them, and Newsom soundslike a perfect candidate" is completely acceptable, but I’ve alreadythought of it.)
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I think the better parallel for Joanna Newsom (particularly with Ys) is probably Kate Bush or Bjork. You either love them or you can’t stand them (Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights music video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqV65Vw7U9Q, for example is just as polarizing as Newsom’s stuff). I personally like all of them, but I completely understand the hate. The things I like about Joanna Newsom (her committment to pretension, her squeaky voice, her rambly poetic songs, her harp, etc.) should be completely off-putting, and they usually are in most contexts, but there is something I can’t shake about her music. I can’t stop myself from listening to them. Also, you should give her a chance live. In a concert setting a lot of the things that grate about her seem to be toned down. The current show she is touring around the country is one of the best concerts I have seen in awhile.
I think the better parallel for Joanna Newsom (particularly with Ys) is probably Kate Bush or Bjork. You either love them or you can’t stand them (Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights music video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqV65Vw7U9Q, for example is just as polarizing as Newsom’s stuff). I personally like all of them, but I completely understand the hate. The things I like about Joanna Newsom (her committment to pretension, her squeaky voice, her rambly poetic songs, her harp, etc.) should be completely off-putting, and they usually are in most contexts, but there is something I can’t shake about her music. I can’t stop myself from listening to them. Also, you should give her a chance live. In a concert setting a lot of the things that grate about her seem to be toned down. The current show she is touring around the country is one of the best concerts I have seen in awhile.
I agree with Whitney. I do not like this artist. I felt like I was supposed to, kept trying to give the music a chance, but threw up my hands and gave up!
Ugh! Love the harp, hate the voice. I remember listening to her first disc once and all my friend and I could do was laugh hysterically. It’s hard to take serious someone who sounds like Minnie Mouse on crack.
Ugh. Thank you. I’d been reading/hearing about her everywhere, downloaded a couple of songs, and remembered instantly everything I loathe about the music hype machine. I hope she finds her Sir Loin of Beef in Shining Armor, and settles down at a quiet ren faire in a land without recording equipment.
I really love Joanna Newsom, and there are lots of reasons for it. I don’t understand the predilection of cultural critics to deem something “pretensious” simply for it being different and not boring. I can see why some people wouldn’t like her music, but then I again I can’t see why someone would like B.S. like Nickelback or Akon. Maybe my finger isn’t on the pulse of America and I’m completely out of touch, but I, for the most part, like being challenged by the music I like or love.
You listened to a whole CD of that? TWICE?!
It feels good to let it out. I DON’T GET HER! And I love ancient sounds in pop music: Dead Can Dance, Loreena McKennitt, Rasputina. But this is just a dull little girl who grew up wanting to be as creative as Kate Bush, but came off more like a creepy child actor in a Twin Peaks dream. I’m all for pushing boundaries but at the same time, just because it hasn’t been done (harp as pop with twee vocals) doesn’t mean it should.
I respect others for liking her, but like her from your heart. What if your indie gods had dissed her? Would you still embrace her?
I completely agree. I actually grew up with Joanna in Nevada City. Totally sweet girl. Had several classes with her. She’s undeniably talented, but she’s been doing the same thing with a harp since thrid grade. I think her new album is a vast improvement over her first, which succeeded at sounding more grating and rambling than the worst of Bjork, but even though the new stuff is a little more melodic, it’s still very renaissance fair. But don’t listen to me because I’m biased. Mainly because she has turned her back on her friends from home. It’s a shame. Side note: the back story of Sadie from her first album was about her dog Sadie who always crossed the street to the Jacobson farm to chase and eat their chickens. One day Dale Jacobson said if that dog comes to my farm one more time, I’ll shoot it. Guess what happened. Don’t feel bad for her. Dale is a cool guy. He was just deffending his livestock.
I love Joanna! The album is absolutely lovely to me, and I actually think she has a beautiful voice. She’s hardly twee, I might add. Twee is pure indie pop. This can hardly be called pop (although there is an exception: “Bridges and Balloons” is an absolutely beautiful, tear jerk of a pop melody. If you really can’t stand her voice, maybe try and get the Decemberists cover of it?). What’s wonderful about Ys is that it strays away from that sort of music, like it’s a prolonged lullaby. She’s never struck me as pretentious, unlike, say, Ben Gibbard or Pitchfork or even, on occasion, Dave Eggers.
Yes, I cannot stand Ben Gibbard. I’ll take the beautiful, surreal lyrics of Joanna Newsom over emo-lite crap like “I Will Follow You Into The Dark” any day.
I am a boy who I like to think does not possess a predilection towards twee, and I find Joanna Newsom okay in small doses. “The Sprout and the Bean” is a song that I enjoy because it seems evocative — maybe of my latent testosteronies (not a real word), but evocative nonetheless. Newsom’s shtick gets old pretty quickly though, and anyone who says she is underappreciated as if they’re bestowing their musical expertise upon us gets on my nerves especially.
Her songs are deliberately cloying and ultimately shallow, though the irony of that is lost on the “Pitchfork” psuedo-snobs who lump her in with all of their other Important music. Although (heresy in T-minus 5…) I feel the same way about Karen O and she doesn’t play a harp.
Ah, yes, I found “Bridges and Balloons” in a last-ditch attempt to make you guys see the beauty in Newsom’s music. Come on, give it a listen! Here a blog post with both Joanna’s orginal version and the Decemberists’ cover version available for download. Check it out and tell me if you don’t like her just a LITTLE bit after you hear it–or, at the very least, if you like her a little bit when someone else is singing what she’s written.
http://rewriteablecontent.blogspot.com/2006/11/joanna-newsom-brings-out-child.html
I am a huge fan of Joanna Newsome, and I don’t think anyone would describe me as a “twee indie boy” (although I am a boy and will also cop to loving Built to Spill, another somewhat divisive indie band). I could go on at length about my appreciation for her, but I’ll spare you that. What I will say is this: she’s made music that has moved me very powerfully, has inspired me creatively, and, with her new album, challenged me to open my mind to a sound which I did not take to immediately (unlike Milk Eyed Mender, which I immediately dug). Those are gifts which many less controversial artists never have given me, and I’m grateful to her for them. All that said, my wife can’t stand her voice, and I certainly understand why. For me, it’s not an obstacle, nor is it one for my young kids: they love her!
I can’t stand bananas, but I know lots of folks who swear by ‘em. To each his/her own.
ME MEITHER!! ME NEITHER!! AND I TRIED!! I has her first album on my iPod for like 3 months just to be cool. I thought I was the only one!
Whitney – Thank you for one of the funniest posts I have read in a long time. Even if Joanna Newsome brings not tears to my eyes, you certainly did through laughter.
As as a fan of chamber pop I thought i give this a a listen because all those boring critics that think they know what good music is rave about it. I listen to one sample on Amazon and i could not get past her voice and i listen regulary to Bob Dylan and Tom Waites. Say want you want about how weird Tori Amos, Kate Bush and Bjork are but atleast those ladys can sing.
It’s so funny you posted this today. For a couple years now, one of my best friends has tried to get me into her. Whenever he would play her for me though, I would alternate between sour cringing and uncontrollable laughter. In fact, at the time I was working at a school for behaviorally challenged children and pushed to have the the album play on a loop in the detention room as an incentive to stay in class and STUDY HARD! Anyway, he recently gave me a copy of her most recent album, almost as a joke gift but really with the hopes I might like it. I listened to it soon after I got it and shut it off immediately, never planning to listen to it again.
Anyway, last Monday, I was on an overnight, 24 hour train ride from Atlanta to Boston and was trying to sleep. I was a bit delirious from staying still for so long and tryingv to nod off for a long time. For some reason, I decided to play that album and I have no idea what happened, but I found myself transfixed from beginning to end. I listened to it straight through and then, after it was done…..LISTENED TO IT AGAIN. I have now listened to it six times in three days. I must have just been in that absolutely rare and perfect state of mind to accept it. All the same elements are there that made me hate it in the first place, and now they are the very same elements that make me love it. I’ve been Newsomed!(However, going back and relistening to that Sprout and the Bean song from her last album still induces painful chills down my spine). So, I do feel ya, but I cant’ say I agree anymore.
I don’t think it’s quite fair to say that Newsom is Tori Amos for boys. I love a lot of Tori Amos music. I am not a twee indie boy, but a 24 year old straight (I know) male. I can’t stand Newsom, though I gave her a fair shot. What I’d like to say is that Amos’ songs have backbone. As experimental as she can be, Tori Amos has written some incredibly catchy stuff where you know what the chorus is, and you know what the song is about. As opposed to Joanna Newsom screaming “SAAAAADIE!” in my hear without ANY warning, which alone was enough to want to brutally murder my ears so I didn’t have to listen anymore.
Also, I rarely feel like Tori Amos wants to sacrifice meaning or emotion for the sake of quirk. I think twee indie boys can plug Joanna Newsom in without really thinking about her. They finally have a female singer-songwriter that they can listen to without actually HEARING what a female singer-songwriter has to say! Tori Amos never lets you forget about her emotional (feminine) perspective. While Joanna Newsom is (in my opinion) one-note, Tori Amos is too unpredictable for most indie rock boys to handle.
OH MY GOD! I can’t imagine that anyone is able to listen to this. I find myself to be very open minded, but I wasn’t even able to listen to the entire sample track listed here. That woman is a busted wreck!
I think she has huge talents, and it’s a little unfortunate that the surface trappings (the medieval elf image, the shrill little girl voice) are so easy to get distracted by, because once you work past them you realise what brilliant poetry and melodies she’s making.
A couple of examples:
“And all that I want, and all that I need
and all that I’ve got is scattered like seed.
And all that I knew is moving away from me.
(and all that I know is blowing
like tumbleweed)”
…
“And the signifieds butt heads with the signifiers,
and we all fall down slack-jawed to marvel at words!
While across the sky sheet the impossible birds,
in a steady, illiterate movement homewards.”
…
“Never get so attached to a poem
you forget truth that lacks lyricism;
never draw so close to the heat
that you forget that you must eat.”
Holy crap! I just listened to her for the first time now and I just couldn’t stop lauging. It’s like Smurfette on the Harp. The difference between Kate Bush, Bjork, and Tori Amos, and Joanna Newsom, is that Kate, Bjork, and Tori can actually SING. If I inhaled helium and took up the xylephone, would I be the Next Big Thing?
Joanna Newsom is like a joke in my mind. The fact that people are into her is bewildering to me. I love kate bush and bjork, I think that they are dynamic, but still very captivating performers. This does not hold for Ms. Newsom. She has an irritating voice that grates upon my ears second after second that I hear it, and I just don’t like her aesthetic. Chasgoose said it right: it’s too pretentious for me and that’s saying something because I’m into no wave, possibly one of the most pretentious music movements of all time.
You write: “I give up.”
Oh don’t feel bad, Whitney! You only gave up after a long and valiant effort: Those two listens you gave to “The Milk-Eyed Mender” last year, and the two minutes you spent standing half-inside Rob Brunner’s office listening to “Ys”, during work hours, accompanied by others, distracted by work, and quite possibly talking during the experience! No one can say you didn’t do the appropriate legwork or research before weighing in on the Newsom love-her or hate-her debate!
Any reasonably bright individual who’s spent more than five minutes listening (really listening, not b****ing about how “you don’t get it” while it plays in the background) to Joanna Newsom’s work, particularly her stunning new album, will at the very least acknowledge her gifts, the sheer density and prodigiousness of her talent and her ideas. They may still hate her music, may think she’s demented and precious, and that’s fine and fair.
I’m fine with you not liking her, but I think it’s a bit whack to boast about how little you’ve tried to grapple with her work before making your opinion (very) public. I’m reminded of the time Lisa Schwarzbaum reviewed “Infinite Jest”, proudly admitting to have only read the first 200 or so pages.
Oh, and way to post a crappy BOOTLEG of an early FRAGMENT of a song from the new record as an example of her work.
Who knows…from the number of concurring replies, maybe you ARE doing some kind of public service by giving voice to all the Newsom haters out there. But I still don’t think you’ve given her a fair shake.
You write: “I give up.”
Oh don’t feel bad, Whitney! You only gave up after a long and valiant effort: Those two listens you gave to “The Milk-Eyed Mender” last year, and the two minutes you spent standing half-inside Rob Brunner’s office listening to “Ys”, during work hours, accompanied by others, distracted by work, and quite possibly talking during the experience! No one can say you didn’t do the appropriate legwork or research before weighing in on the Newsom love-her or hate-her debate!
Any reasonably bright individual who’s spent more than five minutes listening (really listening, not b****ing about how “you don’t get it” while it plays in the background) to Joanna Newsom’s work, particularly her stunning new album, will at the very least acknowledge her gifts, the sheer density and prodigiousness of her talent and her ideas. They may still hate her music, may think she’s demented and precious, and that’s fine and fair.
I’m fine with you not liking her, but I think it’s a bit whack to boast about how little you’ve tried to grapple with her work before making your opinion (very) public. I’m reminded of the time Lisa Schwarzbaum reviewed “Infinite Jest”, proudly admitting to have only read the first 200 or so pages.
Oh, and way to post a crappy BOOTLEG of an early FRAGMENT of a song from the new record as an example of her work.
Who knows…from the number of concurring replies, maybe you ARE doing some kind of public service by giving voice to all the Newsom haters out there. But I still don’t think you’ve given her a fair shake.
Imagine my complete lack of surprise, (or would it be more palpable to the pop culture obsessed among us if I say, “I am Jack’s complete lack of surprise”?), that a magazine that revels in celebrity gossip and industry hype wouldn’t “get” Joanna Newsom. It’d be like asking a half-empty box of cereal if it “gets” macroeconomics. Appropriately, Gwen Stefani graced the cover of EW last week, (I laughed out loud when someone in the article compared her to the Clash, and then almost vomited when I realized they weren’t joking). Now, I know that Joanna Newsom could never aspire to create lyrics as rich and nuanced as “Let me hear you say this s**t is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S,” (I mean really, it works on so many levels; banana as potassium-rich fruit or banana as a metaphor for the military-industrial complex. Ingenious), but bless her twee, elfin heart for trying.
Ok, let’s make a deal. I’ll listen to Tori Amos, Joanna Newsom, and artists who try to be adverturesome and experimental. You can listen to whatever manufactured pop crap radio stations are being paid to play this week. Clearly, EW’s love of brainless reality television and pay-for-play corporate music is evidence of a profound level of taste, and I feel unworthy to criticize. But you’ll have to forgive me if I base my musical interests upon actual listening and knowledge of music, and not accountant’s decisions about which 19 year old will move the most units, and therefore is deserving of promotion.
This is a joke, right? It’s really Lisa Simpson singing these songs, right?
Whitney, I wish you would have thrown Ms. Newsom into the water, and not just the CD, because this music is atrocious. And just for the record, I love indie music, hate rap, and don’t go in for most of the pop crap that everyone is moaning about.
Ben Gibbard and Dave Eggers liking this stuff is reason enough for me to stay far far far away from it.
I love Joanna Newsom. I wasn’t taken completely with her first album (her voice does take getting used to), but then I saw her perform live in Chicago a couple weeks ago and was completely blown away. After seeing her play live with her band, I don’t think I could ever doubt my love for her. I think all of you who have only given Joanna a few listens haven’t listened to her enough. Or try to see her live and then I promise you’ll be convinced. Unless you’re really close-minded and only like music that’s complete crap.