CD Review - Tracey Thorn
Out of the Woods. 11 tracks. Virgin/EMI.Few singers can find the heart of a song like Tracey Thorn. For more than two decades as the voice of Everything but the Girl, The 44-year-old Brit ably navigated a maze of musical styles from gauzy jazz/pop to jangly neo-folk to angular electronica by zeroing in on the work’s aching core. Her emotional compass is aided by a husky, melancholic tone that sounds like the hitch one gets in the throat right before a long, liberating sob.
But though that compass is uncannily accurate, it’s not infallible, and on “Out of the Woods,” only Thorn’s second solo effort in 25 years, she loses her way. On indefinite leave from EBTG—co-founder and longtime paramour Ben Watt seems content to focus on DJ-ing at the moment—the singer has recruited a cadre of beat-masters from the British electronica underground, including producer Ewan Pearson, who has worked with Goldfrapp and Depeche Mode. The result is a synth-heavy album that blips and burbles along with little purpose or panache.
The CD, released earlier this spring, opens on a gentle note with “Here It Comes Again,” a sing-song-y lullaby about the elusiveness of happiness. It’s pretty in a generic way, but notice how Thorn’s trademark tone has been processed into a smooth, soulless whisper. It’s an unfortunate sign of more wrong-headedness to come.
Things quickly turn inexplicable on the next two tracks, “A-Z” and “It’s All True,” which sound like outtakes from the Bronski Beat and Howard Jones catalogs, respectively. One imagines Thorn being held captive by a rogue band of ‘80s obsessives, forced to croon along to antiquated synth-pop under threat of torture by prolonged exposure to Flock of Seagulls. Then along comes the autobiographical “Hands Up to the Ceiling”--Thorn wrote most of the lyrics on the album-- and it becomes clear she is complicit in this nostalgia trip.
Here we find the vocalist happening upon an old nightclub that figured prominently in her past, which once played host to “Terry Hall [The Specials, Fun Boy Three] and Siouxsie Sioux.” Back then, Thorn recalls, “everything I knew was good,” but now the thrill is gone. “I closed my eyes and something passed me by,” she moans. “I didn’t even try, and I don’t know why.”
OK, fine. We all went to transcendent club shows back in the day. But Thorn’s plaintive reminiscing would be more palatable if some of her heroes’ verve was on display here, if, for instance, the song whooshed with the swirling fury of Siouxsie and the Banshees or skittered along on a Specials-like ska beat. As it is, the tune is a limp lament.
The news isn’t all bad. “Get Around to It” works a relatively current groove – at least this time Thorn only reaches back to 1994, and EBTG’s own Top 10 hit “Missing,” for inspiration. The best track is the album’s closer, “Raise the Roof,” which, despite its synthetic beats, manages to sound warm, ingratiating and modern.
But that’s the closer, and by the time it rolls around even longtime fans may be scratching their heads and pining for Watt's return. File this one away under “Unfortunate Misfire,” and cross your fingers that Thorn will find her way back to the path she’s traveled so surely for so many years.