The Aurora Review
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Summer 2005 |
  FeistLet It Die Arts and Crafts/Interscope Records Reviewed by Tracy M. Rogers Originally released in her native Canada in May of last year, Feist's Let It Die is filled with catchy pop melodies with hints of jazz, folk, and soul. But Feist's music is not bubblegum in the least. Anchored by her fluid vocalizations, Let It Die features a mixture of both old and new sounds unconcerned with genre combined to evoke a mood of romantic desolation and desperation. The album's two opening tracks, "Gatekeeper" and "Mushaboom," are both anchored by pop-folk acoustic guitar riffs but are sonically dissonant. Over the subtle strumming of a folk guitar, the former tells of a summer romance that fizzles with cold weather, while the latter is a more humorous take on romance and financial hard times, with a whimsical ragtime feel of acoustic guitar and drum loop. "Leisure Suite," a song about a transient love affair, brings in yet another soundscape, that of toe-tapping, finger-snapping dance-pop. The common thread through each of these tracks and the album as a whole is the sparse arrangements by Feist and her collaborator, Canadian rapper/producer Gonzales. While the first half of the disc consists of Feist originals, tracks seven through eleven are covers, ranging from the traditional drunken lament, "When I Was a Young Girl," to a retread of the Bee Gees' lover's lament, "Inside and Out." Feist's cover of Ron Sexsmith's introspective "Secret Heart" shows that even a glittering popster can be ragged around the edges, while the French classic, "Tout Doucement," transports the listener to the Parisian nightclub circuit. The album's concluding track, "Now At Last," a 1950s jazz classic about loneliness, features Feist's vocals with only solitary piano accompaniment, concluding the song cycle of romantic desperation and desolation. Let It Die offers little hope for the lovelorn, but throughout Feist lyrically creates the ambience of loneliness and desperation while producing pop music that is evocative and poignant. |