Chelsea Girl - Nico

Chelsea Girl
Nico
Verve V-5032
1967

A mono pressing of Nico's debut album.  I was watching a dvd of a Nico concert from much later in her career and after the show some college kid interviewed a bored Nico in her dressing room.  He asked her why there were no songs from this album in her repertoire.  Her response was something like they weren't her songs, although that did not stop her from performing in her concert all of the Velvet Underground songs she sang on their debut album.  I know what she meant though, this record is completely unlike all her other records, it attempts to mold her into a pop chanteuse with commercial appeal.  Good luck with that.  The liner notes compare her to Mary Travers (which is ludicrous) but I think the real role model here for producer Tom Wilson and arranger Larry Fallon was Judy Collins.  This record sounds a lot like the chamber pop and genteel folk rock albums Collins cut with Joshua Rifkin in the mid-1960s.  That is practically the opposite of Nico's personal style which emphasizes minimalist rock and roll and moody drones.  Despite Fallon and Wilson's meddling, the presence of Lou Reed, Sterling Morrison and John Cale both as musicians and as songwriters throughout the record still gives it the feel of an extension of "The Velvet Underground & Nico" although much less charged.  The album begins however with the first of three songs written by Jackson Browne who had a romantic relationship with Nico for awhile.  "The Fairest of the Seasons" was co-written with Gregory Copeland and features a delicate guitar accompaniment from Browne bolstered by strings.  The song is typical of Browne as he verbosely considers commitment issues.  If he were singing it I'd be bored, but the inherent drama in Nico's deep voice makes the song seem profound, even moving.  The string arrangement is heavy-handed, but I think the instrumental color it provides greatly enhances the feeble tune.  Browne also wrote "These Days" which has identical accompaniment.  I'm no fan of Browne's own version of this song, it sounds phony to me, but Nico's worldly persona and the heavy grain of her vocal give the song the gravity and feeling it needs to overcome Browne's glib cleverness.  It is one of my favorite songs on the album.  "Little Sister" was written by John Cale and Lou Reed and its dark, romantic lyrics are more consistent with Nico's gothic persona.  Cale's droning organ is also more in keeping with Nico's personal style although the song also features strings and a flute that apparently Nico found very upsetting.  Admittedly the cheery chamber pop that results works against the dark tone of the song, but it does not bother me too much.  This is more of a problem with John Cale's bleak "Winter Song" where the flute and strings are truly obtrusive and completely undermine the feeling of the rest of the song.  This is unfortunate because the song is otherwise perfect for Nico.  Side one ends with "It Was a Pleasure Then" by Cale, Reed and Nico.  This is the song on the album that is truest to Nico's style.  It is a minimalist tune featuring Nico solemnly intoning the gloomy lyrics with Reed noodling around on guitar emitting occasional shrieks of feedback and Cale brutally sawing away on his viola.  No chamber pop on this one, it reflects both Nico's past with the experimentally minded Velvet Underground and the uncompromising and personal music she would make in the future.  A great song.  Side two opens with Reed and Sterling Morrison's "Chelsea Girls" which is based on the Andy Warhol film of the same name that Nico appeared in.  It is the song that sounds most like Nico's work on "The Velvet Underground & Nico" aside from the string arrangement and flute which once again undermine the dark lyrics of the song.  The song sticks pretty close to the film, but you don't need to have seen the film to understand the lyrics which are typical of the detached descriptions of decadence favored by Reed in songs like "Venus in Furs" and "Femme Fatale" and it ranks with Reed's best work from that period.  Nico's vocal is mesmerizing, I wish I could erase the strings and flute from it, it would be a masterpiece.  "I'll Keep It With Mine" was written by Bob Dylan another paramour of Nico's.  According to her, he wrote the song about her and her baby and gave her an acetate of it to record.  She waited too long though and Judy Collins beat her to it.  It was also sung by Sandy Denny with Fairport Convention on their second album, "Fairport Convention."  Nico's performance is surprisingly energetic, she sounds very inspired.  Nico is a far more limited singer than Denny or Collins but I think this is the definitive version of the song.  "Somewhere There's A Feather" is another Jackson Browne song which Nico sings with engaging enthusiasm.  The optimism expressed by the lyrics couldn't be further from Nico's oeuvre, but she sounds very convincing crooning it and to his credit Browne manages to restrain his usual long-winded approach to write a direct and lovely song.  "Wrap Your Troubles in Dreams" was written by Lou Reed for the Velvet Underground.  If you think Nico is a bad singer you should check out the Velvets' demo on the box set, "Peel Slowly and See" featuring John Cale on lead vocal.  The song sounds dreary and lifeless in the Velvets' version, Nico's version is so much more vibrant and appealing.  On this tune the string arrangement makes the song stronger.  The album concludes with Tim Hardin's "Eulogy to Lenny Bruce."  This song has a very minimal arrangement relying on the intimacy of Nico's vocal to carry the song much like most of her later solo work.  The song is about Lenny Bruce who had recently died and the song decries his drug use which seems pretty ironic coming from Hardin, a longtime junkie who would also die from a drug overdose (and of course Nico herself was no stranger to drug addiction either.)  I think this album is largely a betrayal of Nico as an artist, but I still like it.  Yes it is over-produced, but the songs are terrific and suit her voice and persona extremely well.  In contrast to the gloom and doom she projected on her later records, on this album Nico sounds lively, even charming at times.  As a big chamber pop fan, I often like the sound of the record even when it works against Nico's vision.  Besides the compelling quality in Nico's deep dramatic voice ultimately transcends Wilson's attempt to smother her with pretty music, her inner darkness can't be suppressed.  Unlike her later records where the unrelenting gloom of the music can be wearying (to me at least), this album, with its dynamic tension between the singer and the music, is consistently interesting and stimulating.  Recommended to people who prefer "Femme Fatale" over "Heroin."

Late For The Sky - Jackson Browne

Late For The Sky
Jackson Browne
Asylum 7E-1017
1974

I've never liked Jackson Browne yet somehow in the past few years I've seen him live three times and enjoyed his performance each time.  I saw him cover Warren Zevon at a Dawes show, I saw him cover the Everly Brothers with Jenny Lewis and cover the Beach Boys with Dawes at the tribute to Glen Campbell at the Hollywood Bowl and most recently I saw him do a guest spot with My Morning Jacket down in Irvine.  He did a Dylan song and "Late for the Sky" off this album.  Having the best live band in the world back up Browne is like hiring Wolfgang Puck to make the pizza for your little kid's birthday party, but boy did it sound great.  Despite all this I haven't changed my mind about Browne, I still find him kind of boring.  I was a teenager during his heyday and despised him, lumping him in with James Taylor and the Eagles and that whole 1970s singer/songwriter scene as well as the laid back Southern California country rockers that I blamed for ruining rock.  That was unfair to him, he was more talented than those guys and when I was in college I softened a bit and bought some of his albums in bargain bins and garage sales.  Most of them now sit on my purgatory shelf while I decide whether I really want to keep them.  The only one I ever liked much was "Running On Empty" because it was relatively rough and even rocked a little.  However if I had to name his best album, I'd probably select this one even though I rarely play it.  The most striking thing about it is the cover which I think is one of the best ones of its era.  Browne's biggest asset is his lyric writing which is evident in the opening track, "Late For The Sky" which is the best song on the album.  It is a stunning portrait of alienation and a disintegrating relationship delivered with a mournful country rock tune.  I don't think Browne is a good singer, but in this case he expresses considerable feeling and I find his performance more moving than usual.  David Lindley's guitar solo is very expressive as well.  "Fountain of Sorrow" covers a lot of the same ground but it is not quite so bleak.  The song is more uptempo as well, pushed along by Jai Winding's energetic piano lines.  Browne's vocal is typically bland, I have to force myself to pay attention to the words.  The song goes on too long, I lose interest before it peters out.  "Farther On" is very introspective as Browne examines the role of music and dreams in his life and persistence in the face of perpetual failure.  It is a lovely song, but it hardly has any tune and is largely carried by Browne's vocal which just makes me wish someone else was singing.  Side one ends with "The Late Show" which is another relationship song that stresses the importance and difficulty of relating to another person with honesty and openness.  It is more mournful country rock, but Browne's dreary vocal makes the song sound more whiny than confessional.  The Eagles-ish harmonies from the background singers (who include J. D. Souther and Don Henley, yuck) don't help any.  Side two kicks off with the only song on the album that could be considered a rocker, "The Road and the Sky."  The song uses the metaphor of a road trip to examine themes of fulfillment and freedom.  It is propulsive enough to keep me from getting bored and even has a little guitar noise.  It figures that the most musically stimulating song on the album is also the shortest one.  "For A Dancer" is a eulogy for a dead friend that touches on the meaning of existence as well.  It has one of the better melodies on the record and a lovely fiddle solo from Lindley, but it is ultimately undermined by Browne's dull vocal.  "Walking Slow" is a light song by Browne's standards in which he takes a stroll feeling good although he also takes a little time to mention his relationship troubles as well.  It has an appropriately punchy and jaunty tune, but Browne's vocal is hopelessly stiff.  The album finishes with "Before the Deluge" which is a depressing song about the futility of human life in the face of the apocalypse as well as the disillusionment of youthful hippie idealism as his generation grows older with a little ecological rage thrown in as well.  Musically it is the usual tedium until the final section where the chorus and Lindley's fiddle give the song some much needed vitality.  I admire Browne's songwriting ability, he writes intelligently and expresses himself with vulnerability and sincerity, but as a performer, I just can't relate to him.  I think the decisive cross-references with Browne are Joni Mitchell and Paul Simon.  Mitchell also writes deeply personal and highly poetic songs often with minimal musical accompaniment but she is a world class singer who can bring out the feelings in the words.  Paul Simon isn't that much more expressive as a singer than Browne, but he writes memorable melodies that enhance his songs which is something that Browne can't do with any consistency.  Recommended to Bruce Springsteen fans who like his slow songs better than his fast ones.