The Best Thing I Heard This Week-Feist

I picked up the new Feist record with some trepidation. While I'd always enjoyed a few singles ("Mushaboom", for sure), she'd never been able to hold my attention for a full album. Worse, her new record, Metals, was being given the dreaded "pretty ok, but not great" review by pretty much every outlet, ensuring a decent but sleepy record by a respected artist. So I was happily surprised when I found Metals to be not only engaging, but my favorite Feist record yet.

I imagine Leslie Feist as a sorceress, especially on "Undiscovered First." When she begins the song ("I had / what I thought / were clear / open eyes"), it sounds like an incantation, and as her voice slowly rises ("you can't unthink / a thought/ either it's there / or not") you can feel the spell (or rather, the chorus....sorry) coming on. The chorus begins the chant, which isn't complete until a convincing yelp at 2:22. Finally, at 3:45, her voice comes in full force, complete with chain-gang percussion, as she sings "Is this the right mountain / for us to climb? / Is this the way to live / for you to be mine?" [1. Normally, I'd embed a youtube video of the song, but looks like her record company has scrubbed all those clean. You can still listen to some it for free here, and it's a record that's worth your hard-earned dollar.]



Amazingly, this transitions to the more folksy "Cicadas and Gulls," vaguely reminiscent of Van Morrison. On "Comfort Me," Feist takes another bluesy turn, yet somehow avoids joining the ineffectual glut of other contemporary pop artists who have tried to do the same. Using her voice and percussion, Feist circumvents the soft rock abyss of FM radio you hear at your dentist's office.



As mentioned in every review of the album out there, there are no danceable tracks a la "1 2 3 4," but there are sing-alongs, most notably the surprisingly un-creepy "Graveyard," where Feist compels us "whoa oh oh oh oh oh / bring them all back to life!" On "A Commotion," Feist builds tension with her falsetto voice and taut strings before the chorus of "A Commotion!!" which is less raucous but plays up because of the control and restraint she employs with her voice. There are no tracks here you would put on at a party, but that does not mean the record is without excitment. Rather Feist uses a slower, bluesier tempo to get the effect.



It's impossible to view Feist's achievments on Metals without looking to some of the other fantastic records released by female performers this year. Metals contains a lot of the same tensions present on Gillian Welch's The Harrow and the Harvest and St. Vincent's Strange Mercy, but resolves them in a different way. Whereas St. Vincent resolved her tensions with stinging guitar solos, and Welch hers with the help of the inimitable David Rawlings and a voice steeped in tradition but unlike any other today, Leslie Feist controls her songs like a puppet master. She moves her stringed instruments with her voice, pushing the ebb and flow of the songs as she pleases, with guitar not as electric (not literally) as David Rawlings, but just as deft. The final vision of the record, however, is more Bob Dylan than anything contemporary. Feist shows an utter disregard for "popular music" or whatever is expected of her, instead opting to create a record which is at times haunting, harrowing, merciful, bluesy, and happy, as it changes on her whim. She is a master of her craft, a fact most visible on "The Bad in Each Other." Importantly, she succeeds in creating her vision, and Metals is nothing short of great.

Feist - The Bad In Each Other (Jools Holland) from DavidWeiszfeld on Vimeo.

Photo by Paul Schreiber