Cat Power/ Chan Marshall- genius or fruitloop?

Anyhow, I agree with Nitsuh that she can be excruciating live. Once I saw her and she was telling them to turn up and turn down the monitors for 15 minutes. Having said that, she *was* a live powerhouse in the tour right after moon pix, when she was with two fellows (one of whom I believe was Jim White) who helped rein in her more neurotic impulses, I think. There are some people who don't need to eb onstage alone, and Chan is one of them.

ronnylongjohns: she's been singing this song, I saw it last summer too ronnylongjohns: I'm very eager to hear again, I hope she puts it on a record BlueOtterTwo: which song? ronnylongjohns: I dont know the name ronnylongjohns: It's the chorus I like BlueOtterTwo: tell me more BlueOtterTwo: ? ronnylongjohns: the chorus starts w/ her whistling this little melody ronnylongjohns: then she repeats the melody twice more but not whistling BlueOtterTwo: whistling?! ronnylongjohns: 2nd - wah wah WAH wah WAH ronnylongjohns: 3rd - Doo doo DOO doo DOO! BlueOtterTwo: neat ronnylongjohns: o my god it is the cutest thing I have ever seen BlueOtterTwo: i want it ronnylongjohns: at the end she got the audience whistling ronnylongjohns: over and over ronnylongjohns: while she did the wahs and doos BlueOtterTwo: i cannot whislte BlueOtterTwo: whistle ronnylongjohns: and when she realized that everyone was whistling ronnylongjohns: she got this tremendous grin ronnylongjohns: ahhhhhhh..... ronnylongjohns: sigh BlueOtterTwo: i think you are alive ronnylongjohns: I was for a minute there BlueOtterTwo: i meant in love

I have become the owner of "Myra Lee." I told my mom she might like Cat Power, but she didn't, so she donated the CD to me. It's okay so far. Previously the only Cat Power song I'd heard was that really popular one--I think it was called "I Don't Blame You."

This is, as you kidz say, OTM.

chan was a big inspiration for me. a fruity folk heroine. the new dvd is out in a couple weeks. two hours of her playing outside in a field.

i want to make creep folk pscyh noise with her and she has me demos.

as for her live, Nitsuh is OTM. the thing is, live, when she is onto something & havng a good night. the show works at a level that no other singer-songwriter reaches today. i have a video of her from knitting factory 96 and she does this version of water and air that is just downright gut wrenching genius.

I think so far Myra Lee is my favourite Cat Power album, despite never hearing it before. I have What Would The Community Think, Moon Pix, and The Covers Record and I think I'd rank them so:

Myra Lee > What Would The Community Think = The Covers Record >> Moon Pix

I know a lot of people like Moon Pix best but I just don't get it. Am I alone?

http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/08d7e6b5ae/kids-songs-with-cat-power

Well, good that she can laugh at herself,

It's not exactly funny though.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C3FFkIIUkAA-L5O.jpg:small

finally, a definitive answer to the question in the thread title

Oh nooo

ummm... false?

no, wait, true - but correlation is not causation?

i give up

holy shit no!!!

chan :(

omg have you followed her on twitter, i did for a week or so

nope... fruitloop?

This (upthread) was clearly not watched enough. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ubigmaH2AOE

She's being funny come on.

Or is she?

doubt it

Genius

what kind of question is this, geniuses usually are fruitloops

Otm

wish she'd release a new album.

What would the community think and moon pix are such gorgeous albums... very vulnerable and spare and her voice is what I consider the perfect lullaby voice. For a while back in the mid 90s she was the coolest cat for me.

She kind of lost me after moon pix though... there were some good songs here and there but there was some sort of innocence lost after moon pix... maybe mine maybe hers ... at any rate I lost that connection to what she did afterwards. Those two still make me fall in love with her when I listen though.

Her cover of sea of love is so nice

those two are my favorite too

oh how time flies...

I dont know anyone in real life who knows her music and that makes me feel so alienated. I think they are pretty much classic albums and they were an important part of my teenage years so I want someone to tell me how much they love them and shaped them too but I’m all alone on this one. I have resigned myself into thinking I’m the only person in this city who even owns those albums.

no way those records are too popular there is someone out there

Not in the middle of mexico it seems :(

I might start printing out posters that read “have you heard me?” all over the city with the album covers and my phone number. Maybe there’s a soulmate nearby.

it's a good idea

hey Moka FWIW those records shaped me a lot too, with ya there

Those are the two, it’s true

You Are Free is also a very good record.

I really love her piano playing where she does a triad in the left hand followed by the same triad an octave up in the right hand on alternating weak and strong beats. It's really effective.

any of you know joanne robertson? she's pretty much a copycat but she's put out some great songs

Moka, you have a friend in Montreal if you ever visit!

I feel that way too about the power of Moon Pix to cement friendships.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/musicblog/2011/oct/07/moon-pix-cat-power

i love moon pix as well. you are free is great but moon pix is just The One. during the time that i was getting really into her music, our local cd store was awful and never had what would the community think, and napster didn't quite exist yet, so unfortunately i never really connected with it in the same way.

Thank you Ross and Sean!

Sean your experience with the album mirrors so much my own. If you change the age to 16 years and the location from canada to mexico I might as well felt like I was reading myself! Thanks for making me feel slightly less alienated... also your description about her late career is spot on. She’s in a happier place nowadays it seems and how can I demand she goes back to breaking my heart. Back then I just wanted her and myself to live through the melancholy and we have... most of time.

I love all her stuff. I guess I fall in the genius camp, because I find even her failures fascinating.

seems amazing and wonderful to me now that cat power releasing a video of her ambling through songs in front of some bushes for 40 mins felt like a significant cultural event to me at the time

You are not alone, Moka. My fave album of 1998 is Moon Pix. I discovered her on the tour for that album. She was mesmerizing.
https://musik.antville.org/stories/1133632/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jv7UTCGD4hI

Alex: tuff choice between Mezzanine and Moon Pix for 1998... I love them both for very different reasons.

Flappy: oh wow she’s way too drunk or drugged in that performance. There’s still something endearing about her singing in that state but I would hate to be a musician trying to keep up.

i straight up love the redo of "metal heart" that she recorded 10 years after the original
her return from the abyss of self-loathing/depression/substance abuse was really inspiring to me and that song distills the essence of what i like about her and recontextualizes a song that used to remind me of sad/bad times into an anthem. i think she is a genius.

Never really liked her live. She expected too much from a scenester type crowd that would show up.
In the mid 90s, along with Will Oldham, I remember thinking she was ushering in some new kind of dissonant blues.
A top 50 artist for me. Love a bunch of her albums:

Myra Lee (1996)
What Would The Community Think? (1996)
Moon Pix (1998)
The Covers Record (2000)
You Are Free (2003)
The Greatest (2006)

POX:
We All Die
Still In Love
Good Clean Fun
Nude as the News
American Flag
Colors and the KIds
(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction
I Don't Blame You
Shaking Paper
Living Proof

One of my most uncomfortable concert experiences was a somewhat recent double bill of Cat Power and Rufus Wainwright, who were supposed to perform in that order but got switched because Chan showed up late, and a handful of biddies in the front row did nothing but loudly complain throughout the Cat Power set about how awful and depressing it all was. We could hear every word so I assumed she could, too. I felt so bad for her but she kept going like a trouper, and it was a great set.

one of the most influential american vocalists of the 21st century. for better or worse. worse. but that's not her fault.

still love this one. i don't know her stuff that well, but this one i love. maybe it reminds me of mary margaret a little.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kx6F1jesJ5o

also was she the first person to do an indie rock video with normal/average people/friends doing modern dance/exercise moves in a video. if so she is truly a pioneer.

one of the most influential american vocalists of the 21st century. for better or worse. worse. but that's not her fault.

― scott seward

truth bomb

I love her, I would probably still go see her live if I got the chance

need to hear that Metal Heart remake!

if you want to see her live you should go to australia, wikipedia says:

"In 2018, Marshall will perform a Moon Pix 20th anniversary concert at Sydney Opera House. It will feature album collaborators Jim White and Mick Turner.[54]"

i saw her three times in frankfurt, once on that moon pix tour where she and her band were amazing. then in a kind of living room where she was so and so and then in a 2003 concert which she fucked up totally.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aGP3KirGqsY

jim white!!

i love how much more confident she is

Ogmor - Is joanne Robertson the same artist who put out a record with dean blunt last year? If so, she’s good!

You are free is my favourite cat power record overall

Oh never seen that performance before! Why is that not the version on the jukebox album! Jim White improvising those drums send the performance to another place.

I think one of her “recent” songs I liked was The Greatest she nailed those performances:

https://youtu.be/0KtrQ5nWl7w

She likes that green shirt a lot btw... I think I’ve seen her on different perfomances with that exact same look... some years apart like in Letterman performing “metal heart”

she looks really comfortable in that green shirt. i love seeing her happy and healthy and feeling free to be herself
she may have inspired a lot of imitators but she has always been very much herself, unreproducible

yes ross, same JR, I heard her through the dean blunt collaborations. I like everything she's put out but am especially fond of "dragg" from the lighter

this thread and the relistenings it's prompted have been a joy

Marking 20 years since the release of her breakthrough album, Moon Pix, Chan Marshall (aka Cat Power) returns to the Sydney Opera House, debuting this seminal precursor to the current cultural explorations of female experience.

You are free is my favourite cat power record overall

― after party for the apocalypse (Ross), Wednesday, April 25, 2018 10:37 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

me too

She's no genius, and I think she's a little nuts. But, I like some of her stuff, she can be an interesting singer. I interviewed her a few years ago when she came to Nashville. She mistook my obvious Tennessee-speak for an "Australian" accent--invited me to visit her and introduce myself as "the Australian"--and she was, er, kind of sexy, in a bored-housewife kind of way, on stage, but meandering, unfocused. Another potentially good singer who never quite breaks through into anything I really want to listen to.

^v good post

^by a ripper of a mate

none of you break through into anything i'd really want to read but i do find you all kind of sexy, in an oblivious, entitled way

this is the second time i have seen "bored housewife" used as a pejorative in like a week
what's up with that!?

i straight up love the redo of "metal heart" that she recorded 10 years after the original

I thought I was the only one to like the Jukebox version of "Metal Heart"! I love how triumphal it is.

I love her but some of the things she posts on IG make me cringe (anti vaccine stuff, things about "earthing").

"this is the second time i have seen "bored housewife" used as a pejorative in like a week
what's up with that!?"

its easier to speak in cliches. you don't have to think as hard.

oh no, i adore it
i think i have even mentioned it on ilx before and people argued with me and said it was flaccid or something else totally untrue
i find the live versions of it electrifying but i like the recording too

this is the 2008 version from jukebox

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lofk956GM78

you don't have to think as hard.
may i request slightly harder thinking so the cliche doesn't sound so sexist?

i don't follow her on IG
would rather not know about earthing, whatever that is!

Yes, you're prob better off not knowing.

i mean she was relationshipped into scientology wasn't she? i don't think a person has to be perfect in order to be a genius. she has issues. who doesn't!

Of course not! The pseudoscience stuff is just one of my pet peeves, that's all.

here it is -- i still hope she continues to record it every 10 years. that means she's due! Cat Power - Jukebox

don't like the Metal Heart remake, but the original is one of my favourite songs ever so it's hard for it to measure up

The only time I've seen her live was on The Greatest tour. She was fairly confident on stage but they leaned too far into the whole soul revue angle and it ended up kind of jarring. I seem to recall the band introduced her as "the greatest soul singer in the world" which just...no

lol, agree - not the greatest soul singer in the world
i wish there were some comfortable middle ground to chill in between "i hate myself" and "GOAT"
i guess that doesn't sell though

none of you break through into anything i'd really want to read but i do find you all kind of sexy, in an oblivious, entitled way

― ogmor, Wednesday, April 25, 2018 11:00 AM (thirty-nine minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ogmor otm

I really like this cover of Hanging on the Telephone from a commercial she did. Wish I could find the full length version:

https://youtu.be/0X-5b5kuax8

The one time I saw her was a solo set at ACL Fest, You Are Free-era. At one point, she said something to the effect of "During this next song, I'm going to do something that'll [get my roadie on-stage]...it's his birthday and I want you to sing to him when he comes out." I don't remember how she got him out there, but he came and seemingly several hundred people sang "Happy Birthday".

I've never seen her live, but I've read that Chan once lipsynced to Smoosh onstage. I'd die to see that.

I saw her in '99 and it left little impression on me though I was a huge fan. I was living in NYC a couple of years earlier and wish I'd caught a show then but she wasn't on my radar yet

I was obsessed with her music '98-'01 or so, and I lived in Atlanta for most of that time so I saw her a play a lot. Several were of the wrenching, "this person seems unwell" variety, though tbh I was young and couldn't tell whether or not it was just debilitating stage fright or something scarier (the latter I realized later).

A bit later, I saw her in London and everyone sat on the floor and didn't make a sound, even shushing people, which was faintly ridiculous really. I think the best performance I ever saw was in ATL when she played during a screening of Dreyer's silent "The Passion of Joan of Arc," which was an inspired combination and not being the center of attention suited her well.

I'm sure I was at at least one of those shows with you Rob.

What always struck me was how good looking she was under that sheen of indie despair and drug use. The photos Richard Avedon took really brought that out.

i really like how rudimentary the piano playing is on "you are free" - reminds me of pj harvey's white chalk - clearly these were artists not operating within their typical wheelhouse and all the better for it

Also a shout out to Manhattan on her last album which is one of her best tracks. It's so simple in some ways but it has so much momentum.

I saw her solo circa You Are Free in an art gallery where she I think was not in a good way and played three songs in a row on her Danelectro then three in a row on piano then back and forth, with barely a break or any talking. Then I saw her later on The Greatest/Jukebox era soul revue thing where she seemed in way better form. Musically I preferred the former but it felt a bit weird enjoying it even then. I think if I was older, I would have felt even more uncomfortable.

saw her twice circa moon pix; one time was a complete shambles that was embarrassing to witness, the other was utterly riveting and fantastic

iirc having jim white glowering behind her was beneficial to the latter; glad they are working together again

I'm not a production guy or someone who thinks about it much but Sun is one of the worst-sounding records I think I've heard. Whatever she does next I hope it isn't with whoever produced that. I was sure it was etienne de crecy but google isn't showing up results for that.

it was Philippe Zdar who mixed it, that's what I'm thinking of.

Horrible.

iirc her label more or less compelled her to work with a producer just to finally get the record out? not sure how it came to be zdar tho

saw her twice circa moon pix; one time was a complete shambles that was embarrassing to witness, the other was utterly riveting and fantastic

the Moon Pix era show I saw was riveting for the first half and a disaster for the 2nd

I hadn't heard the album or anything and was like "wtf is going on here"

you don't have to think as hard.
may i request slightly harder thinking so the cliche doesn't sound so sexist?

ha. well, she seemed like someone who was happy to putter around the house, but was still a bit bored by the end of the day, so she gets a little drunk and then tries to sing and can't quite cut it. she wasn't very good. I think this could apply to men as well.

She had a lot of nice things to say about Teenie Hodges, so she's got good taste in guitarists.

when a 46-year-old bored housewife claims she's recorded "nine feminist bangers," i pay attention

in other words, she was unprofessional.

I like all of her albums, really. You Are Free is my favourite. I rate Sun quite highly too - anyone else have anything nice to say about that one?
Both of her covers albums are pretty great as well.

The Greatest might be my least fave, it sounds a little cheesy at times. I've only seen her once, it was either the tour for that album or one shortly thereafter, where she played a lot of songs from it with a band, and I didn't think much of that concert at all. I had understood that she has a reputation for unpredictable live shows but that time sounded very formulaic to me, lacking heart, with a band that sounded like a bunch of studio players without any passion.

Unfortunately, I can't help but get a gnawing demon in my head whispering "Vaccine truther!" whenever I think of her these days. Luckily I manage to silence that demon enough to subsequently still enjoy listening to her records.

Edd you're coming off a little patronising in your comments - I don't know you of course, but I'm letting you know how it's coming across. Whatever her difficulties Marshall is a serious artist with a significant body of great work and deserves respect.

Wait... Chan is a scientologist nowadays!? Sigh noone’s perfect

I don’t want to know don’t tell me

It’s weird if they wanted to push her voice as soul but then again not sure what tag genre it fits? Blues mixed with slacker indie from the early mid 90s... slacker blues maybe... but soul idk...

Edd are you serious man? christ

I don't see a big difference between unprofessional and highly erratic performer. There's plenty of musicians I love that I have no desire to see live again (Westerberg & Lucinda jump to mind pretty quickly).

Pretty big Sun fan here as well-Manhattan, Nothin But Time in particular are gorgeous.

Sun is exceptional.

I saw her once on a bill with Sleater-Kinney when I was in high school, she performed (I thought pretty well) for 40 minutes or so, not really engaging much with the audience, then said “knock knock,” we answered “who’s there,” and she walked off stage.

xp Jukebox is maybe her only bad album, and even that one has "Metal Heart"

She was one of the best indie artists of the late '90s and early '00s and I've kind of been puzzling over why her stature has fallen so much in recent years, but reading through some of the comments in this thread it's like, oh yeah gross sexism

xp lol, that's pretty good

i saw her solo in 98 or 99 and she did not seem to be in a very good place, but when she sat down at the piano and played "i found a reason" ... wow.

yeah her version of that song is so devastating

my fave memory is of seeing her at Bumbershoot in 1999 maybe a year after that Moon Pix tour, the Covers album hadn't come out yet and slowly figuring out that she was playing "Satisfaction" w/o the chorus totally gave me chills

haha, literally listening to Jukebox and thinking how great the Dylan cover is in particular.
I love the two 'Memphis'records (Greatest/Jukebox).

I've seen her play live twice, both times had a...rollercoaster quality if you will.

teenie hodges is basically god

I think I was pretty fair to her in this 2013 interview piece.

I only ever saw her live once, in 2001, at Reading Festival, while Papa Roach were on the main stage. It was not good. Could barely hear her over the nu-metal

I saw her once on a bill with Sleater-Kinney when I was in high school, she performed (I thought pretty well) for 40 minutes or so, not really engaging much with the audience, then said “knock knock,” we answered “who’s there,” and she walked off stage.

― JoeStork

that is amazing.

I have never seen her live. I hope to someday. Found this the other night, didn't know she was on tour - pretty good performance!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xoMsddrowY

Saw her on MoonPix tour in a tiny club in 98 with Jim & Mick, this show in fact:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f4XqTl0ACoY

which was uh... a bit up and down, she was very very nervous. This video seems to belie that.

The only other time I saw her was on The Greatest tour with the Memphis Soul Review in a larger seated theater, pretty good from what I remember, I'd had a bit of wine at dinner (it was my birthday).

I'm definitely the wrong kind of Cat Power fan cause my fav alb is The Greatest, also her Dylan parody is hilarious

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1Ic2-N8Vo0

Lol at that knock knock joke. Always heard the album cover to the Smog album Knock Knock (cat + lightning) was a Cat Power nod, guess the title is too?

The 1-2 punch of "Still In Love" into "Rockets" on Myra Lee is one of my favorite song pairings ever, even better if I can crank it up to deafening when the drums kick in on the latter.

I've kind of been puzzling over why her stature has fallen so much in recent years

I'm not sure how much her stature has fallen, but whatever it is, I'd put it largely down to releasing one album of original material in a decade.

Jukebox is maybe her only bad album, and even that one has "Metal Heart"

And Song For Bobby is great too!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ss1uN1IHyA

Wanderer out October 5 on Domino.

https://media.pitchfork.com/photos/5b4ed569c2c1a63dc091b2ed/master/pass/Wanderer.jpg

01 Wanderer
02 In Your Face
03 You Get
04 Woman [ft. Lana Del Rey]
05 Horizon
06 Stay
07 Black
08 Robbin Hood
09 Nothing Really Matters
10 Me Voy
11 Wanderer / Exit

Cat Power + LDR is a teamup I did not anticipate.

Same!

oh god I can totally hear it too

oh hell yes.

sweet! the only show she's playing near me is opening for the national! not sweet!

My body is ready.

Any idea who is producing this one? The SVN album was self-produced and it showed, I think production is a key thing for my dislike of her past efforts. She has either sounded undercooked (SVN) or too cleanly adorned... like bordering on bland mor music (jukebox and greatest to some degree). Sometimes the songwriting and her voice makes it tolerable but when it’s bad it’s unlistenable to me.

PR says it's self-produced

Mmm well cautiously excited for this one then.

as someone who generally doesn't notice these things, I have to say that the production on SUN was abominable. I listened to that album once and binned it.

philippe zdar was ~involved~ with the mixing/production

this really is a horrible thread title

in beth's defense, it was before the towers fell

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sd8nU87OCrA

Match made in heaven. You are free comes to mind

Great addition to "songs in which a doctor gives advice/diagnosis."

Lana might as well not even be there.

relatable

Lana might as well not even be there.
otm

good song though, and production is good too (Moka)!

the backing vocals are subtle enough to have just been another backing vocal from chan - the lana name probably helps more than anything to bolster sales tbh

i'd rather the extra vocals be more on the subtle side than too bluntly thrown in; imo she definitely adds to it, although it'd be nice if she was in the video

the refrain becomes a bit much at the end but otherwise good song

good new song. excited for this album. I liked Sun well enough. I wish she'd released more albums and yes I think a bit part of her stature dropping was her not putting new original material out more often, also, she really did have a run of terrifyingly terrible live performances for a number of years there that sullied her reputation. I saw her with MIck and Jim touring for Moon PIx at a tiny club in Berkeley and she was great but ran off the stage the second she was done and didn't come back. The next four shows of hers I saw were erratic, unfinished, weird, scary. Then I didn't see her again for many years until recently opening for Nick Cave and she was so good solo in a huge outdoor venue with really not a lot of people listening to her. I'm glad she's doing better. She's very talented.

Really excited for the record.

I was wondering how many of the current crop of female singer songwriters she influenced; I hear her in van Etten, Waxahatchee, Angel Olsen for example.

i'd assume like 7/8 of them?
i'm playing a show with a cat power tribute next week -- the influence is kind of difficult to measure imo. it's not just the singing or songwriting (though it is that) it's even the act of speaking up and writing songs in the first place

she is super influential

let's all try to remember these nice things next time she says something we don't like about vaccines

Sadier has defended Jordan Peterson, being anti-vaxxers is small leagues.

xxp hope you'll post some of that show, LL, if feasible.
"Sexy bored housewife," also "bored housewife" (also just ["plain"{ "sexy"), don't seem like perjoratives to me, necessarily: somebody at loose ends, restless, can't won't anyway isn't satisfied, in an enclosed space, all her own and yet not--isolated anyway, on stage or off, in the biz and yet not, in some ways (not the standard antiquated production schedule). relatable Yes.

I liked Jukebox, and blogged this (it's chunky, look out)
posted 3.10.2008
The Record to Beat in '08
Cat Power's Jukebox. I used to find her tiresome, but she's not
overplaying the waif card here, even though this probably her most
romantic album, her most truly atmospheric, because in order to have
an atmosphere, you gotta have gravity, from the right substance in the
spin. Every time the music starts, her voice first reaches me as a dry
ice smoke ring 'round the moon, over the shining spine of historee
(great and good old and newer songs coming together, and coming up in
just a minute) with a vivid poise that keeps her from sounding too
earnest: it's just the right, sensuous sound (especially as it moves
through her musical companions' reverb, echo and grooves) for her
cosmic quest, for romantic and spiritual fulfillment. (Janis Joplin
answered, when asked what Today's Youth are looking for: "Sincerity,
and a good time." Hey hay hey.) The confidence as well as
sensitivity—so of course "New York New York," with just a simple
adjustment of its seatbelt, should have this tensile lope and sway,
backbeating right past Radio City rinky-tink, with ingenue still in
tow/charge. She's totally at home with the Dirty Dozen Blues Band,
especially drummer Jim White, of the Dirty Three and recent,
noteworthy collabs with Nina Natashia; Judah Bauer of the Jon Spencer
Blues Explosion(! But he does not play no fratblooze here) is also
aboard (with Eric Papparozzi on bass and Greg Foreman's keyboards),
but this little combo is less like a blues band is usually expected to
be, more like rockers who have learned much from the Hi Rhythm
Section, in terms of taut, spare punctuation and momentum, fitting
Chan Marshall's vibrant reveries perfectly (the one time she holds
back a bit, seemingly getting lost, on "A Woman Left Lonely,"
Foreman's electric piano tremolo gets more emphatic, rallying her,
appropriately for a song about a woman who's coming back from
rejection). The sequence of tracks is very effective: after "New York
New York," Hank Williams' "Ramblin Man" is recast as "Ramblin' Woman,"
and the original's melodramatic, spooked compulsion is tempered by a
certain expansiveness: she knows this kind of journey is where she's
meant to be, not that it doesn't matter who and what she finds. A new
version of her "Metal Heart" follows, with a confrontation, a note to
self and other, that steadfastness , mettle and "metal" is in the
sound, not heavy metal, but the electricity moving through natural
elements, 20th Century engine-uity revving up again in these old
songs, which sound as timely as ever. The sleek, starlit,
meta-metal's also there in Lee Clayton's "Silver Stallion" which
practical-minded Cowgirl Chan leads from mythology or decoration, out
into her own prospects, and "Aretha" is wistfully, unpretentiously
invoked, to re-inspire her lover and herself, also (as repeated
listenings reward), I think of this as prefiguring later songs, as I
relate it to Dylan's line from Tarantuala, "Aretha, crystal jukebox
queen (the album's title from this?), I shall play you as my trump
card." I think of that because I know she'll reach Dylan's own "I
Believe In You," with Bauer accentuating the Stonesy riff with which
Dylan foresaw "Start Me Up," and White's drum leaps develop a hip hop
cast, kicking off the mud of a town through which one proud outcast
searches for another. Marshall's own "Song For Bobby, " reminiscing
about various near-misses with the Master, could easily be gushy, but
she's even too grown-up for that now. She strikingly connects
Dylanesque phrasing to Billie Holiday's, on the latter's "Hush Now
(Don't Explain)," reminding me of D. 's description of his later songs
as "overlapping phrases on an electrical grid," the overlapping of
expression and reticence, austerity and warmth in the shadows. Which
is also where the hope and fear meet in, Jessie May Hemphill's "Lord
Help," just as "We're all reborn, to face the morning sun." Uh, and so
on, with some surprises: I didn't even recognize Joni Mitchell's
passive-aggressive self-pity/guilt-tripping you-dumped-me classic,
"Blue," at first, cos Chan doesn't imitate her at all! Not even in
this age of girly-swirly chamber folk, not at all (and the band's just
bumpin' at the walls of the break-up, you know it'll all work out as
it should or will). This girl is a woman now! (But not too scary with
it.)

Also liked Sun.

Cat Power and Grouper are always linked in my mind, even if Harris was never a Cat Power fan. their chords, their voices (to an extent), the intense melancholy and despair.

I’m not a huge fan of the chorus (gets a bit repetitive) and Lana’s feat is a bit useless? Doesn’t sound much different from the usual Cat Power overdubs / backing vocals... if I hadn’t known it was Lana I wouldn’t have known... hell i still don’t hear it.

That said this is well produced which was my main fear and has some bite to it which was missing in her most recent albums so I’m lookibg forward to hearing the rest.

That outro just melts me.

The Rihanna cover:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-Tsk-cPXxI

it's a very natural cover for her

i hate the title of this thread

^^

The title of this thread always makes me smile. Cat Power usually doesn't, so in the end I find the title really perfect.

if it were me being described, i would much prefer "fruitloop" to "sexy bored housewife"

her arrangement of "stay" is interesting. it's like she just chose her favorite parts/lines to sing and forgot about the rest.

Like she did with "Wonderwall"?

and "Satisfaction"

yeah i guess that is her thing
i like it
it's definitely her own

OK maybe her stuff doesn’t always work or the risks backfire instead of paying off - but seeing her raw alchemy like that, who could doubt she’s a genius, with all the baggage that often entails?

I usually roll my eyes at acoustic covers of pop hits but her voice, her delivery, and the way she picks the song apart and saves only a few verses from it totally sells it to me. I need to dig out The Covers Record, haven't listened to it in years, but I remember loving many tracks from that one.

the covers record was excellent. jukebox I didn't like as much.

I actually prefer Jukebox!

When doing covers she usually only keeps the low key parts like the verses... I feel like she’s insecure of her range or she just isn’t fond of big choruses.

Sea of love is so nice

Weird because the Jukebox version of "Metal Heart" has a humongous chorus.

On her cover of the VU's "I Found A Reason" she omits the verses and just does the chorus(x2) as the verse and then turns the coda into a chorus.

It's nice but I'm a much bigger fan of 'guitar Cat Power' than 'piano Cat Power.'

what's funny about that song is that I was more familiar with her version than theirs because I'd never picked up Loaded at the time. Then years later when I heard the VU version I couldn't place where I knew the song from.

I can't say I like the Rihanna cover much -- it's not too different from the original, which for me has a more spectral quality. This one by comparison is more tepid.

i watched this earlier without knowing it was a rhianna cover. i vaguely recognised it and somehow concluded it was a fleetwood mac song.

i liked low's cover better and it was a pretty straight-ahead cover iirc

but cat power's is definitely hers

Oh my, that Funny or Die video posted upthread is pretty much exactly like the one Cat Power live show that I saw.
Every time I see this thread title, i think the answer is: Yes.

NYT profile:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/20/arts/music/cat-power-wanderer.html

Interesting tidbits about her breakup with Matador.

Rob Schnapf, a producer for Elliott Smith who mixed “Wanderer” and engineered some recording sessions, said that Ms. Marshall knew “she did not want to make a big record — she absolutely did not.” He recalled moments of inspiration in the studio where the spirit would hit her: “Her eyes would roll back and she’d just channel and go,” he said. “You can’t make that happen. Either you’ve got the genie in the bottle, or you’ve just got the bottle.”

But Matador rejected the album.

“They said, do it again, do it over,” Ms. Marshall explained. (Mr. Slater confirmed that Matador told him “Wanderer” was “not good enough, not strong enough to put out.” The album will be released by Domino.)

Ms. Marshall said she’d received the same mandate from Matador during recording as she had for “Sun,” her previous album from 2012. “It was like, ‘We need hits!’” she said. “And I did it — I got Top 10. I did the best I could to give them hits” on “Sun,” using bright synths and more modern sounds. (“Sun” has sold 114,000 albums to date including streams, according to Nielsen.)

But to Ms. Marshall, the label had always represented artistic freedom. “Looking back, I know they were using me,” she said, recalling a Matador executive playing her an album by Adele and telling her that that was how a record was supposed to sound. “I understood that I was a product,” she said, “and I always thought I was a person.”

Matador said in a statement: “Chan Marshall is without question one of the most talented, brilliant artists we’ve been fortunate to know,” adding: “Our working relationship with Chan has not been without difficult moments. We’ve had disagreements over matters both artistic and business, but none of that changes our respect for her as a person or performer.”

Ms. Marshall said she did not alter the music after the label change, but did add a track: “Woman,” featuring Lana Del Rey, which in many ways became the defiant, upbeat centerpiece of an understated album, beginning with a folky, pointed lament:

If I had a dime for every time
You tell me I’m not what you need
If I had a quarter I would pull it together
And I would take it to the bank and then leave

Asked if the track, which has received more than a million YouTube views in a month, was a middle finger to her ex-label, Ms. Marshall demurred: “Thank you for asking, but no comment.”

She did, however, compare some indie-rock circles to a fraternity, with little space for a lone woman without a band or a manager. “I had to fight a lot for little stupid things, but I just thought, ‘That’s what I do,’” she said. “Pavement’s going to the Bahamas or something with the label, Interpol is going to St. Lucia or wherever with the label. I remember yelling: ‘Can you take me out to dinner? I’d love to go to a fancy place!’”

a Matador executive playing her an album by Adele and telling her that that was how a record was supposed to sound

wow!

Can't wait to see Gerard's rebuttal to that lol...

FWIW, Matador also recently rejected a Malkmus album.

wait pavement went to the bahamas on matador's dime? is that real?

I'm playing "fact checking cuz" with some quick web searching, but all I'm finding are references to her interview.

Though here's Malkmus in 2001 (after Pavement's breakup), saying he's never been there:

Q: What do you do when you're not working on music?

A: "That's a good question. I hike, hang out, go see movies, eat, read, do yoga, go to the gym sometimes, tennis, go on vacation. I went to Hawaii for two months, that was great, (and) Southeast Asia. We like to go warm places; it's cold here. Maybe we'll go down to the Bahamas, Caribbean-type area. I've never been down there, maybe we'll try that. The Grenadines? That sounds good to me."

I know that none of the Pavement albums were recorded in exotic locations; they're not this dude - https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/lenny-kravitz-on-recording-his-new-album-in-the-bahamas-249128/

Looks like Matador artists Fucked Up played the 2011 "Bruise Cruise" from Miami to Naussau: http://matablog.matadorrecords.com/2011/09/23/fucked-up-malkmus-jicks-this-weekend-in-nyc/

Sorry to derail (further), but this is a great quote from that Kravitz interview:

You put DJ Military, a local guy from Eleuthera, on your new song “Boongie Drop.” Did he freak out when he heard that Jay-Z is on that one too?
It’s like living in Mayberry. He said, “Yeah, cool, man.” That’s his whole reaction! I brought Mick Jagger there once. We went to a shack to get a beer, and they asked, “So, what do you do?” He was like, “I make music.” “What kind of music?” “Rock & roll.” “Oh, great.” Then the guy started talking about fishing.

I'm surprised by this from Matador and not to a degree. Running a label and selling music has been hard so I can't really denigrate them for asking for hits. On the other hand I can't imagine Cat Power albums are extremely expensive to produce and I'm sure they see a return on anything she put out with them.

just gonna say that imo Chan is bullshitting in much of the above. also, just to speak in general terms, when an artist cancels a giant tour for which they've hired expensive session guys, or doesn't make what they were supposed to make on a big tour, the label often is the one who absorbs the cost - which is then billable to the record that was gonna be promoted. in re: the cost of Cat Power albums to produce: studio costs are 1) the cost of the studio 2) the cost of the producer, engineer, mixer 3) the cost of the musicians you hire 4) travel & lodging & food for everybody. iirc she hired session guys for The Greatest, right? session guys cost MASSIVE DOLLARS. as do big studios. as can string arrangements depending on where/how you get em done. if you have your shit together, you can, in a big studio, finish three or four songs a day, cutting costs. I don't have any inside info on how many days it takes in a studio to do a Cat Power record, but Sun was recorded in four different studios, in Malibu, Silverlake, Paris & South Beach. Traveling internationally & working internationally jacks up the budget severely especially on the lodgings q usually. I can't speak to the other studios but the Paris one she picked is a huge destination studio that's been profiled multiple times by the NYT, the Fader, etc., people go there to make the records they submit to NARAS for consideration.

So my guess is that the budgets for these records are very large.

Even though “The Greatest” was getting good reviews, a tour in support of the record had to be postponed because of her problems. Her label, Matador, estimated that it lost more than $100,000 on marketing and promotion, paying her supporting band (including a onetime member of Al Green’s band) and canceled shows.

Once the tour got under way in April, Matador bought insurance to be on the safe side. But now that the tour is a success, and the album has sold more than 100,000 copies, Matador is rereleasing the record, with new album cover art and a new promotional push.

https://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/20/arts/music/20cat.html

a Matador executive playing her an album by Adele and telling her that that was how a record was supposed to sound

i find it hard to believe that anyone would do this, let alone someone from the label that released 'what would the community think'

...in 1996

the principal people involved are the same then as now

I haven't had much contact w/Matador offices since 2009 but back then I knew everybody in the office and I 100% do not believe that story, at all.

like, it is a lie, is my opinion.

So verdict is: fruitloop

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=na-TrimoFPU

Very good performance on Colbert.

album is good. not as great as Moon Pix, You Are Free, Covers Record, or the Greatest, but it's good. ON the whole it seems a little ... safe? Which is fine I guess because Sun is like the complete opposite of this and this album is better, certainly.

She has really polished her live act, she sounds really good in that Colbert.

I don't like that performance at all. It is boring and lifeless. Her erratic personality with the ups and downs which was always an important part of her performances seems to be completely gone. The voice as well sounds streamlined to me. It used to be so expressive, now it is totally controlled. I think I have lost all interest in her music. To be honest I already had given up on her after the Covers Record which I still liked because of the nudity of her versions.

Her erratic personality with the ups and downs which was always an important part of her performances seems to be completely gone.

this enrages me. she's healthier now. demanding & celebrating instability from performers for our own vicarious thrills is so fuckin gross.

otm

her erratic performances were not fun. I saw several of them. I left at least a few early because they made me too uncomfortable and they were, at times, frankly, scary. The first time I saw her (with the Dirty Three) she was charming, though obviously had some stage fright; the next few times were just...no. I'm really glad she's not in that space anymore. She's immensely talented. She deserves her success.

I shared dressing rooms with her during several of those performances. the way people romanticized & continue to romanticize that time & those shows makes me sick & is a major factor in how jaded I am about music criticism in general

https://www.thecut.com/2018/10/cat-power-wanderer.html
how has this not been posted yet?!

I love this:

But the rejection galvanized her. “The 70-year-old me, whom I have yet to meet, was like, You ain’t got no time for this shit. You fucking fuck those motherfuckers. You got your kid here. Keep working, do what you do. Life will continue. You’re going to be okay,” Marshall explains.

Maybe the songwriting has gotten blander than what she did on the 90’s but I prefer this level of professionalism and overall healthiness in her than those erratic, trainwrecked performances that were very common in her 20+ years ago. She was miserable and as someone who went to one of her concerts, it also made for a terrible listening experience. Most of the people in the concert I went to wanted their money back. I didn’t ask for my money because I felt really bad for her but it was really not a good show.

at the time I certainly didn't think I'd be going to see her again in 2018, in fact I probably doubted she'd be around by now.

I mean I prefer it in the live performances. I too prefer the music from way back then.

Chan is in general a very frustrating vocalist for me because I really love her voice and she is easily in my top 20 but I rarely find her musical choices interesting.

listening now, this album sounds great!

People who loved older Cat Power performances simply for her 'erratic personality with all the up and downs' just like to jerk off while watching women fail on stage, don't they? I thought we moved past that.

Anyway, the new album is giving me strong Covers Record / You Are Free vibes in how understated and stripped down it is. I was actually surprised how stark it sounds after the messiness of Sun and the lushness of The Greatest. Not breaking any new musical ground, sure, but I like it and I can see myself coming back to it a lot in the upcoming months.

I feel like that whole attitude is just the logical end-point of the whole fetishisation of imperfection/fragility/precariousness you get in some indie rock circles. As an aesthetic preference it's defensible (even if it's one I think is mostly lame) but when you're extending that to behaviour that's a product of obvious mental illness... I mean that's just grim.

I don't remember anyone saying "wow Elliot Smith is so much better now that his sets are a goddamned drugged up mess"

contemplating the fragility of existence always makes me horny

the idea that women artists aren't sufficiently fascinating unless they are figuratively bleeding on stage has always burned me up.

32 minute radio show from today. Music and interview.

https://www.kcrw.com/latest/live-on-mbe-cat-power

^ Thanks, this is awesome! A Cross Bones Style / Nude as the News mashup!

Also a p4k feature

https://pitchfork.com/features/5-10-15-20/the-music-that-made-cat-powers-chan-marshall/

I feel like that whole attitude is just the logical end-point of the whole fetishisation of imperfection/fragility/precariousness you get in some indie rock circles. As an aesthetic preference it's defensible (even if it's one I think is mostly lame) but when you're extending that to behaviour that's a product of obvious mental illness... I mean that's just grim.

― Matt DC, Friday, October 5, 2018 7:08 AM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

definitely this but also the age old cliche' spouted by lots of non-hardcore music fans I've met who believe one must SUFFER for their art, which is total nonsense.

I fell in love with Myra Lee and Dear Sir without really knowing anything about her (or drugs, illness) in the dial-up era, I still vastly prefer everything through You Are Free to anything after.

I don't see her substance abuse or mental health as integral to what made those albums great, though. The issues probably also robbed of us good live versions of that era, which is tremendously sad to me. She's said that "He War" was supposed to be a Stonesy rave-up (and performed it live that way, I guess?) but I've never found anything recorded in that style.

I still vastly prefer everything through You Are Free to anything after

this record led me to You Are Free last night, which I had somehow never heard in full, despite the fact that I love Moon Pix and WWTCT? is one of the most important albums in my life. fantastic, fantastic, fantastic. I actually did get a bit of a Stones vibe from the jagged syncopated riff in "He War."

you are free is my #1 cat power pick, other than Moon Pix

Never would've expected Autotune on a Cat Power song, but then I would've said the same about drum machines prior to Sun (an album which I really like, seems the ILM massive sniffs at it).

I really like most of Sun but the three songs in the middle (Always on My Own > Real Life > Human Being) are basically subpar outtakes compared to the rest. They really drag the album down and mess up the flow in my opinion, whereas one of the best tracks from that era (Back in the Days) is just an iTunes bonus.

You Are Free always felt underrated to me. It’s easily one of her most solid records if not the most solid. It loses steam on the second half (“names” being a highlight amidst them) but the first 8 songs are amazing.

I don’t remember where I read that she doesn’t sound as comfortable on a piano as on a guitar but oddly enough I think most of her best performances are usually behind a piano and You Are Free’s best cuts are all piano-based imho.

It’s not my favorite album of hers but individual tracks are amongst my favorite Cat Power songs. There’s some beautiful moments in there that she hasn’t rivalled anywhere else in her work.

I feel like that album is peak Cat Power and everything after it marked a descent. I like hearing the way up, those albums before it, but the albums after it not so much. I have not lost interest at all though she’s always been worth following.

New record still hasn’t won me completely but I think her voice sounds incredible and the whole thing is very tastefully done. It might just be the wrong time of year for me to listen to it.

I wouldn't say You Are Free is underrated. It was kind of a breakthrough album for her

Isn't You Are Free the only one that's been semi-canonised?

I love old school CP (haven’t heard “Nude as the News” rhapsodised, to me it’s breathtaking) but I will rep hard for the title cut of The Greatest - conventional, sure, but the vocal is one great melancholy bruise and it wrecks me every time.
But of course Moon Pix is the colossus.

I like the stuff pre-Moon Pix best but then I suppose I would wouldn't I - Myra Lee and What Would The Community Think - yeah Nude as the News is great, and the single Headlights which Discogs categorises under Cat Power (2) because Cat Power was apparently a band then vs a solo project later.

You Are Free always felt underrated to me. It’s easily one of her most solid records if not the most solid. It loses steam on the second half (“names” being a highlight amidst them) but the first 8 songs are amazing.

I don’t remember where I read that she doesn’t sound as comfortable on a piano as on a guitar but oddly enough I think most of her best performances are usually behind a piano and You Are Free’s best cuts are all piano-based imho.

― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Wednesday, October 10, 2018 2:58

yeah! Also the rudimentary style of the piano playing is super effective, much like the way it was on White Chalk

if any of them are canonized it's Moon Pix

though I feel like MP, WWTC?, and YAF are equally well regarded. seems like the split itt and at large is between pre and post The Greatest.

The Covers Album seemed major at the time, and I might prefer it to her originals.

most of her albums, except maybe the very first, were critically well received. allmusic gives them all 4 - 4 1/2.

some notes on WWTCT:

- Michele Romero of Entertainment Weekly gave the album an A-rating, writing that Marshall "raises goose bumps on What Would the Community Think with bluesy, traumatized songs on which she whispers laments over a spare arrangement of guitar and drums

- Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield called the album "leaner and tougher" than her previous release, adding: "It's a quiet album, but the songs get more powerful the closer you listen, as Marshall testifies to her unbearable longing for an unbearable love."

- Music critic Mark Groescher wrote of the album: "Listening to What Would The Community Think is like watching a friend on the verge of losing her mind. It is a wild and sometimes disturbing ride, but it is completely honest. And like any great blues album, it is contagious."

- Biographer Elizabeth Goodman referred to the album as Marshall's "most violent, angry work, a deranged epic filled with sadness, guilt, and defiance."

- Allmusic's Heather Phares says "An intimate, personal album, What Would the Community Think makes imperfection beautiful and turns vulnerability into musical strength."

I like the earlier albums more because they're raw and less lush and beautiful sounding. There's less reverb on her vocals.

I feel like a sham Cat Power fan since I've tried a number of times to get into Moon Pix to no avail. "Cross Bones Style" is great, but the other tracks don't move me.

if "Metal Heart" doesn't move you then you must have...uh...a metal heart

I like the Jukebox version!

oh well then you're beyond help

Come on! That version is beautiful and I hope she re-records it every 10 years for the rest of her life.

metal heart is the essence

saw an amazing show by Cat Power last night in PDX. This was my 3rd show of hers and I don't think I have ever seen her as comfortable on stage before, and she sounded amazing. setlist was pretty close to this one:
https://www.setlist.fm/setlist/cat-power/2018/astra-berlin-germany-53960fe1.html

Today’s email from Matador (25% off sale)(the “Nearly 15%...” line has a strikethrough):

As we reach the end of 2018, it would not be an exaggeration to say we’re in the midst of many difficult moments in human history. The icecaps are melting. America is on the brink of a constitutional crisis. You can’t walk 15 feet in any major metropolis without breaking your neck on a discarded scooter. Your personal data (including everything we collect in this campaign) is being used for nefarious means. Nearly 15% of the public believes we actually told someone to “sound more like Adele.” Nearly $40 million was spent to produce “The Hurricane Heist”

lol

hahahaha

Good Song Exploder podcast about "Woman":

http://songexploder.net/cat-power

she was completely amazing tonight in Oakland. Now I feel like I've slept on her live performances for the past few years. This was kind of beyond great.

Cat Power/ Chan Marshall- genius or fruitloop?

Err, make that "Dear Ms. Power, please sound more like Adele" - Cat Power - Artist Poll #99 - VOTING THREAD

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNoj4oXvQI8

that ending <3