Ys - Joanna Newsom

...far off.

Ys (pronounced 'ees') is Newsom's second album, and is a rather more lavish production from her debut 'The Milk-Eyed Mender'.

She plays harp, in a slightly unconventional, but nonetheless pleasing manner, and sings her own highly obscure lyrics with an equally quirky voice.

The words (which frankly don't make much sense) are published in a lavish 32 page insert - Ys is a mixture of folky solo ...
...probably lacking the mass appeal that would make the public want to forget her in a couple of years.

To sum up Ys in two words I would suggest; 'compulsively intriguing'

Don't try to make any sense of the album, just enjoy the originality.  ... more

If you're the sort of person who likes 'X-factor' Joanna Newsom very unlikely to 'rock your boat'.

On the other hand, like me, you despise everything the TV reality show stands for, appreciating the offbeat and quirky, this could be right down your street.

I first heard Newsom around a week ago on Radio Three, I was driving the car and wasn't really paying a great deal of attention, but found myself trying to remember the tune until I eventually looked up the track listing on the BBC website.

A quick search on GOOGLE revealed a number of sites offering streaming content of this, and other works - for someone so relatively unknown she seems to have a highly supportive fan base.

Newsom doesn't so much write the sort of catchy ditties that everyone can sing along to after four bars, but manages to create what the Germans call an Ohrwurm, literally 'ear worm'

Whilst I'd want to fall into the easy trap of trying to describe her in terms of simple comparisons, if you took Bjork, a bit of Kate Bush (without the shrillness) and mixed in a bit of Macy Gray, you wouldn't be that far off.

Ys (pronounced 'ees') is Newsom's second album, and is a rather more lavish production from her debut 'The Milk-Eyed Mender'.

She plays harp, in a slightly unconventional, but nonetheless pleasing manner, and sings her own highly obscure lyrics with an equally quirky voice.

The words (which frankly don't make much sense) are published in a lavish 32 page insert - Ys is a mixture of folky solo and sophisticated orchestrated tracks - the production of the album is absolutely superb.

The outer cardboard sleeve features a reproduction of a (somewhat flattering) acrylic portrait in Renaissance style, heaped with allegorical symbolism - to me it resembles a mirror image parody of Albrecht Durer's 1498 self portrait - but I'm probably being too clever for my own good there!

Newsom herself, in real life, could be best described as 'elfen' - and at times looks like she'd just walked off the set of 'lord of the rings'.

The inside if the album is made to look like an 1870's embossed book cover in red leather and gold detailing.

At around eight quid, I find it hard to believe anyone will be making any money on this album, but perhaps the record company's in it for the 'long haul' and are concentrating on producing quality over hype.

If you were brought up with the 1970's prog-rock / folk 'concept album' then this will seem very familiar territory - there's almost certainly a message in there, doubtless the arty types would claim to know all about what it's about, personally I couldn't care less it just sounds cool to me!

Unless she's especially lucky, this is unlikely to make it into the top 20 albums, especially being released in the run up to crimbo 2006 - I suspect, however, it'll be one of those 'slow burners' which will find it's way into a lot of CD collections and get played when nothing else quite matches your mood.

Newsom is an undeniably talented woman, unconventional enough to make a mark, but probably lacking the mass appeal that would make the public want to forget her in a couple of years.

To sum up Ys in two words I would suggest; 'compulsively intriguing'

Don't try to make any sense of the album, just enjoy the originality. 

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