I've had to live with this one for a while for it to begin sinking properly in, a process which I think has depended just as much on the passage of time as repeated listens. For a while, it seemed merely pleasant, but lacking in any piercing melodies or texture, as if, for all of Mann's craft, the tunes had been left off this one; but, in the way of these things, it took listening more closely, and just more, for the layers to reveal themselves (extemporanea reminds me that I had a similar journey with The Forgotten Arm way back in 2005).
And what emerges is a very fine exercise in - as ever - sharply observed, poignantly constructed songs that veers perhaps 10 per cent more understated (and consistently acoustically mid-tempo) than anything she's done before, still unfurling, filled with little details that add up, and lit, at the very end, by a trademarkably gorgeous piano ballad in "Poor Judge", hitting with all the more force for coming at the end of a record that's far more characterised by guitar.
It was as far back as 2009 that I was already thinking that Mann might be my very favourite (musical) artist, and she very well still may be (Patty Griffin is the only other who comes to mind). It's worlds upon worlds in her music, and it always comes back to people and how they relate to each other and to themselves.
And what emerges is a very fine exercise in - as ever - sharply observed, poignantly constructed songs that veers perhaps 10 per cent more understated (and consistently acoustically mid-tempo) than anything she's done before, still unfurling, filled with little details that add up, and lit, at the very end, by a trademarkably gorgeous piano ballad in "Poor Judge", hitting with all the more force for coming at the end of a record that's far more characterised by guitar.
It was as far back as 2009 that I was already thinking that Mann might be my very favourite (musical) artist, and she very well still may be (Patty Griffin is the only other who comes to mind). It's worlds upon worlds in her music, and it always comes back to people and how they relate to each other and to themselves.
