Following her horn-laden collaboration with David Byrne, St. Vincent has announced a new self-titled album, from which she gives us “Birth in Reverse.”
Despite perhaps not being the sum of its parts, Love this Giant was great, but it is good to be reacquainted with St. Vincent’s sweetly-sung melody meets weird gnarled edge dynamic. Or, as she puts it well in an interview at The Quietus, a “weird world where music is accessible and likable but cloaked in things that are strange and left field.”
That there is usually a lot going on in St. Vincent songs and the use of brass on Love This Giant show Annie Clark’s musical range, but “Birth in Reverse reminds that she is a guitar player first and foremost. Indeed, she is an awesome guitar player, capable of both creating intricate and atmospheric arrangements but also pulling out a fuzzed-out solo every now and then. Further, the way she uses the low-end of the riff that propels the song shows how the brass sound has carried over into St. Vincent’s solo work. The way Clark’s guitar almost doubles as a tube to provide a backbone to the song similar to the synthesized baritone sax in Vampire Weekend’s “Diane Young.”
In addition, Annie’s new hair aesthetic suggests additional influences carried over from he collaboration with David Byrne. Artists!
Sean Miskell 