Tara’s music is really subtle. When she’s boring you it’s normally with cyclical patterns of guitar, played once, repeated on warm analogue delay: vanilla notes swirling forever. With those scuzzy sawing wheezeboxes choking their last breaths over the patterns, wheezewheezewheeze. These aren’t vicious circles, circles for the sake of circles, ‘cos every time she goes round the loop she gets closer to the center of the thing. Spiralling in towards the moment she’ll never reach, the asymptotal centre of meaning in the world, which she can’t ever break through, which if she could, she still probably wouldn’t, because then she’d have no journey left to carry through. I don’t know why I’m saying this. Neither do you. The immensity of something that big? Coming at the centre of something so small. (“The situation of the post-Communist state seems ideal for literature.”)
So. Yeah, take a little time to talk about Tara Jane O’Neill and the things that you’re doing to make your life seem a little more stable.
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 20:52 (twenty-one years ago) link
― ddb, Friday, 21 March 2003 21:17 (twenty-one years ago) link
― ddb, Friday, 21 March 2003 21:21 (twenty-one years ago) link
Anyway, I love the TJO. Her first album is easily the best. But I do like a lot of In the Sun Lines. (I'm pretending the third one didn't happen.)
What I really like about her music is that it doesn't always go in a straight line; it's structurally unexpected -- and yet it also has this homemade intimacy to it. And actually, maybe the unconventional song forms even contribute to that sense of intimacy: she wants to go off into this out-of-nowhere bridge, so she does. It's an intuitive approach to songwriting. And it's all so achingly beautiful.
I met her once. I couldn't tell if she was nice -- she seemed drunk and nervous.
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 22:14 (twenty-one years ago) link
What I really like about her music is that it doesn't always go in a straight line; it's structurally unexpected -- and yet it also has this homemade intimacy to it. Actually, maybe the unconventional song forms even contribute to that sense of intimacy: she wants to go off into this out-of-nowhere bridge, so she does. It's an intuitive approach to songwriting. And it's all so achingly beautiful.
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 22:17 (twenty-one years ago) link
I posted my previous TJO comments here:
"their level of popularity enhances/detracts from their greatness..."
(Sorry, don't know how to turn that into a link that doesn't display the URL.)
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 22:25 (twenty-one years ago) link
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 22:26 (twenty-one years ago) link
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 22:28 (twenty-one years ago) link
Really, really beautiful. Her cover of Springsteen's "I'm On Fire" is the greatest song ever. That weird, familiar cooing at the end. The circular guitar motif. The tongue click, steady drum. Really, really beautiful.
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 22:50 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 22:51 (twenty-one years ago) link
WTF?? Where is this??
(Also, I agree with your listening-to-her-alone point.)
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 22:58 (twenty-one years ago) link
This little EP which has four songs on: 'If Your Youth is Green', 'Ahn Fair' (the renamed version of the cover), 'High Wire' acoustic, and 'All Jewels Redux'.
It really is special.
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 23:04 (twenty-one years ago) link
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 23:08 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 23:10 (twenty-one years ago) link
Her or Daniel Bedingfield.
Pop star crushes - C or D? Alright, alright, so TJO is hardly a pop star but she's gorgeous, and really sweet. Google yourself in a fit of weary vanity Tara!
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 23:19 (twenty-one years ago) link
Are you M or F, Cozen? Because TJO is a lesbian. But maybe you knew that.
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 23:26 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Cozen (Cozen), Friday, 21 March 2003 23:29 (twenty-one years ago) link
― jaymc., Friday, 21 March 2003 23:32 (twenty-one years ago) link
― J0hn Darn1elle (J0hn Darn1elle), Saturday, 22 March 2003 00:33 (twenty-one years ago) link
― Cozen (Cozen), Saturday, 22 March 2003 00:41 (twenty-one years ago) link
― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 23 September 2003 04:25 (twenty years ago) link
― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 23 September 2003 05:06 (twenty years ago) link
― David. (Cozen), Tuesday, 23 September 2003 12:33 (twenty years ago) link
― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 23 September 2003 13:50 (twenty years ago) link
Star crushes = totally classic and not just because I always have them in spades, and embarrassingly so. (I also like that TJO is gay because there are not enough rockstars in my category; it's somewhat comforting.)
― Blood and sparkles (bloodandsparkles), Tuesday, 23 September 2003 14:52 (twenty years ago) link
― jaymc (jaymc), Monday, 27 September 2004 03:17 (nineteen years ago) link
new record is real nice. kind of washed over me at first but it's very nuanced and balanced on further listens. it's a weird mix of older things, instrumental/guitar tracks and new song-type-songs, but it fits together tidily.
― corps of discovery (schlump), Saturday, 9 May 2009 22:49 (fourteen years ago) link
spinning off from the rodan thread:kickstarting her next record, http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/tarajaneoneil/a-new-offering-by-tara-jane-oneil
her recent 7" is v pretty, also. i am a real sucker for her escalating vocal harmonies.
― blossom smulch (schlump), Friday, 13 July 2012 00:58 (eleven years ago) link
there is a new song. I'll link it in a sec, & her record is out in January on kranky! &! the song cuts off abruptly enough that maybe the record smearily blurs into itself, like tracer does. swoon.
― schlump, Wednesday, 30 October 2013 03:20 (ten years ago) link
https://soundcloud.com/kranky/tara-jane-oneil-wordless-in
― schlump, Wednesday, 30 October 2013 03:21 (ten years ago) link
i am so excited for this
― mustread guy (schlump), Tuesday, 31 December 2013 21:17 (ten years ago) link
i haven't really spent a lot of time with this yet but she makes such mature records, i think; they're always so sensitively recorded, sound immaculate, digress away from her songs very directionally. i listen to her & remember that i like a bunch of people she's probably played on bills with, i like grouper + jana hunter + charalambides, that in some ways she probably fits an aesthetic profile of Stuff I Like, vocals not upfront, guitars strung out like somehow the wind was involved. but i think she's so singular; the attention to percussion is like fully half of what's going on, the noise pieces have this classical edge, there's a real mood to her guitar that's almost more like an eastern gabor szabo thing than it is a haunting-spooky-reverb vibe. i am not super bitter to be the only one bumping this thread liveblogging her in-between-record silences, but they're such great, timely, sleeper records, i think, the last - & maybe this!, idk yet - as just ... good + nice to have on hand as most anything
― mustread guy (schlump), Sunday, 9 February 2014 02:58 (ten years ago) link
man i hate to use the term underrated cuz overrated/underrated is usually such a boring conversation but man tara jane o'neill is so ridiculously underrated
― balls, Sunday, 9 February 2014 03:51 (ten years ago) link
I also think her cover of Springsteen's "I'm On Fire" is the greatest song ever
― JacobSanders, Sunday, 9 February 2014 06:48 (ten years ago) link
^^funny how in 2003 i was like "i need to hear this!" and had no way of doing so.
― jaymc, Sunday, 9 February 2014 07:44 (ten years ago) link
― balls, Saturday, February 8, 2014 11:51 PM (10 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
^^^
in one of my few-times-a-year T J O Moments; all of these songs are such gifts, she's really as good as anybody
― tender is the late-night daypart (schlump), Wednesday, 17 December 2014 05:07 (nine years ago) link
Her album from this year was terrific.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Wednesday, 17 December 2014 05:26 (nine years ago) link
Waaaaait, I didn't even know she had a new album! That's amazing news.
Yes, massively underrated. Aside from Rodan (which I still can't really get into), I love everything she's touched. Definitely one of my most frequently listened to artists.
― My Name Is You (Old Lunch), Wednesday, 17 December 2014 12:32 (nine years ago) link
"Where Shine New Lights" - came out back in March or April.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Wednesday, 17 December 2014 19:32 (nine years ago) link
Yeah, it's really wonderful in an understated way.
― one way street, Wednesday, 17 December 2014 20:28 (nine years ago) link
The openness of her song structures on it and her sensitivity to silence and negative space remind me a little of the last Grouper album (as per schlump's comparison upthread), but of course she's been exploring this sound for considerably longer.
― one way street, Wednesday, 17 December 2014 20:36 (nine years ago) link
I saw her perform earlier this year. She played four or five songs relatively straight, by herself. Then she invited a guy up who played keyboards and they basically just droned for 30 minutes and it was phenomenal.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Wednesday, 17 December 2014 23:55 (nine years ago) link
yeah i saw the same kinda show, once, w/pajo on drums; she'd throw old film canisters turned into rattles out into the crowd, so there was this real chain-clanging panoramic percussion thing on top of everything
& i don't think there's really a stylistic overlap sufficient enough to make her senior to grouper's junior. they used to share a studio in oregon i think.
― tender is the late-night daypart (schlump), Thursday, 18 December 2014 07:49 (nine years ago) link
listenin to tara jane o'neil
― tender is the late-night daypart (schlump), Tuesday, 16 June 2015 02:47 (eight years ago) link
#
― tender is the late-night daypart (schlump), Tuesday, 16 June 2015 02:48 (eight years ago) link
And she apparently has a new solo album out! She seems to fly so completely under the radar. Which is a shame, because she might be among like my top five currently performing musicians.
― Download this Man With Hamburder And Mug (Old Lunch), Friday, 12 May 2017 13:43 (six years ago) link
New album is nice though I need to spend some more time with it.
Earlier this month I went back and listened to all of her solo albums. I realize why I stopped paying attention to her early on - her first couple records just sort of sound like a softer, unplugged version of that mathy/noodly Louisville sound she helped usher in with her previous bands. But around her third or fourth album she moved into something a lot more interesting and relaxed.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Friday, 12 May 2017 21:15 (six years ago) link
New album, “Yoake” - on first listen but so far very good ambient guitar stuff.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Sunday, 10 February 2019 01:10 (five years ago) link
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Sunday, February 10, 2019 bookmarkflaglink
I really liked this when it came out and listened to it a lot for a couple of weeks, then forgot about it. Returning to it today and it's still really beautiful.
― sctttnnnt (pgwp), Monday, 21 October 2019 20:00 (four years ago) link
didn't even know. glad you bumped this!
― maffew12, Monday, 21 October 2019 20:54 (four years ago) link
the sonora pine ii reissue sounds really nice, digitally at least, great record.
― adam, Wednesday, 14 December 2022 19:16 (one year ago) link