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Also this issue: The Big Con Tropical Impressions suitespot Back to Basics Flute Awakening Right On Time Catherine Irwin Kim Richey |
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November 7-13, 2002
musicpicks
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With a splash of water to the face, the Comedown Queen is coming 'round. Beth Orton's past efforts to write through her club daze, which earned her the graceless aforementioned nickname from London's appreciative electronica community, were frank, delicately twisted and, above all, winning. Twice over, she distilled the sheer exhaustion of thinking through a hangover into reverberating electronic-folk melancholy, in 1996's Trailer Park and 1999's Central Reservation. In each, there even shone glimmers of realization that, somehow, the distractions were getting her somewhere. In each, she would gradually edge from fragility towards self-resilience. The problem was, she knew we couldn't watch her start from scratch a third time.
In Daybreaker, Orton embraces forward motion. Just a little, mind: You can still hear the aural echoes of her familiar collaborators: The Chemical Brothers rattle ominously within the sinister landscape of the title track, while Ben Watt (of Everything But the Girl) hides in the production rafters. To these, she has added Emmylou Harris, Johnny Marr and Ryan Adams, who penned the incandescent "This One's Gonna Bruise." Orton's devotion this time around is to fresh, rippling calm, in strings, gentle brass and on occasion just the acoustic guitar (her only accompaniment when she takes the stage at the Electric Factory this week) rather than hyper electronica. Easy classification would say that makes her simply a much more peaceful girl with a guitar, except she hasn't stopped trying to pin down her own butterflies -- her nervous excitement and anxiety -- and putting them in glass cases.
Tue., Nov. 12, 8 p.m., $19.50, Electric Factory, 421 N. Seventh St., 215-336-2000.
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