Apple
delivers mature brand of music
By
Kimberlee Morrison
and Tanya Payne
Online Forty-Niner
You can count on Fiona Apple to make fresh music while staying true to the
piano driven throaty style to which her fans have become accustomed.
Apple’s third album, “Extraordinary Machine,” released last
Tuesday, is likely to capture the hearts of new fans with its pop appeal, while
satisfying longtime fans’ need for great song writing and superb musical
arrangement.
On
past offerings —“Tidal” and “When
the Pawn…”— Apple maintained
simplicity and purity in her music by limiting
the instruments to piano and various forms
of percussions enabling listeners to focus
on her unique vocal style. With her new
album, Apple offers the listener a fuller
and more adult lounge sound.
With a folk-inspired opening, the title track offers the most immediate and
obvious departure from Apple’s usual style. The first few bars feature
a creeping and playful piano accompanied by the singular tinge of a triangle.
At first one might be put off by this new sound but by the time Apple gets
to the chorus where she claims you could “Be kind to me or treat me mean/I’ll
make the most of it. I’m an extraordinary machine,” the listener
is drawn into her lyrical prowess and odd descriptions of relational dysfunction.
In “Window” Apple draws a parallel between a “filthy pane” of
glass (which she decides to break) and a lover who mistreated and cheated on
her.
With a deep and throaty, almost snarling voice Apple asserts “So I had
to break the window/…Better that I break the window than him, or her,
or me.”
While listening, it was hard to put a finger on the reason this recent release
sounds so full and rich. Then it hit me — there is full orchestra accompanying
Apple on the majority of the songs.
“
Not About Love” features such an instrumental component, which lends
a classical sound to Apple’s formally jazz/blues overtones. It is as
if she is singing over a symphony with the hard and emotional play of string
instruments.
Other songs like “Oh Sailor” create nostalgia for the old with
their melodic and skeletal instrumental accompaniment but are still strikingly
different.
Overall the album is a great maturation for Apple, whose sound was often too
emotional and angst filled for those who like music with a light tone. “Extraordinary
Machine” maintains the strong emotion of the past while adding experimental
orchestral arrangements and playful, folksy piano melodies. Apple continues
with her satirical dark edge and lyrics plucked directly from poetry (or so
it seems). The endeavor for mainstream appeal may prove very successful although, “Extraordinary
Machine” is definitely grown folks’ music.
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