By Karen Aney (The Cascade) – Email
Date Posted: October 24, 2011
Print Edition: October 19, 2011
My Brightest Diamond, the name of a group headed by musician Shara Worden, recently released All Things Will Unwind. The musicians who accompany her change frequently in number and instrumentation, but she remains a constant: singing, song writing, and playing a multitude of instruments. Her output until now has been fairly eclectic, ranging from recording her own songs in a Moscow apartment to working on tour with Sufjan Stevens. These experiences have all played a part in comprising this well-trained and diverse artist.
Worden is a classically-trained vocalist, having received her Bachelor of Music at the University of North Texas. While the school isn’t known for its music program, her education nonetheless means that her voice is more finely honed than most on the radio today. This is a constant in her album: in each song, her voice remains consistently gentle and pure. While her training is operatic, she manages to omit the operatic timbre that creeps into some vocalist’s sounds – the waver-y, window-shattering atonal quality that would sound out of place in contemporary music is thankfully absent. Although her voice remains a reliably strong force throughout, the rest of the album suffers from a crippling inconsistency.
The first track is a strong point. “We Added It Up” is a modern take on a cabaret-style song (think Fiona Apple, songs from the musical Chicago, or something you’d hear in the movie Amelie). The accompanying strings are light yet electronic; they wouldn’t be out of place in a video game. Here, the gentle tone of Worden’s voice works: the song is pure fun, for lack of a better description. The next two songs, “Reaching Through to the Other Side” and “In the Beginning”, sound like they belong to a different album entirely. They are slow, moody, and a little depressing. If you can manage to focus on the purity of Worden’s voice, you might get through the listen, but the polarity is jarring.
“She Does Not Brave the War” is the sixth track on the album, and follows the more depressing vein that has been set out by the previous tracks. However, this one seems to work better: it begins with only Warden’s voice and a steadily plucked harp. The second instrument to come in is a flugelhorn – weird name, but you’ve probably heard it before: it sounds like a particularly mournful trumpet. Any other instrumentation remains pretty sparse, mostly leaving just the harp, vocals, and one other instrument. This third instrument progresses from flugelhorn to oboe to flute and so on. All the instruments are quiet, gentle creatures, complimenting the contemplative tone of the song quite nicely.
“Ding Dang” comes next, and it’s night and day from the previous track. This falls more in the same vein as the first song: cabaret-style lilt, this time with some truly unique percussion accompaniment. The rhythms are reminiscent of traditional Chinese music, and it is an excellent counterpart to both Warden’s voice and the song style itself. The following track is “There’s a Rat,” and it seems to be a study in making the banjo palatable in a modern, non-country setting. The heavy cover of strings, flute, and vocals do just that, drawing attention instead to the lyrics, which sound like a children’s story that would be told at the Occupy Wall Street protests.
The album’s a little spastic at times, but an interesting listen. It’s also a nice reprieve from the majority of popular music listeners are inundated with today: the songs are thoughtfully composed, the voice is carefully controlled, and the vocal lines don’t need to avoid difficult runs in order to hide a weak singer. Some songs sound like a soundtrack for an acid trip while watching Alice in Wonderland, and others are political commentaries. All are unique – special little diamonds – but maybe listen to the song previews on iTunes first to make sure you can stomach each of them individually before making the full album purchase.
