audio review : When The Pawn ( album ) … Fiona Apple

audio review : When The Pawn ( album ) ... Fiona Apple

The full title of this album reads like poetry.

When the pawn hits the conflicts, he thinks like a king.
What he knows throws the blows when he goes to the fight.
And he’ll win the whole thing fore he enters the ring.
There’s nobody to batter when your mind is your might.
So when you go solo, you hold your own hand
and remember that depth is the greatest of heights.
And if you know where you stand, then you know where to land.
And if you fall, it wont matter cause you’ll know that you’re right.

Good thing for sweet Fiona Apple, who’s gorgeous when she’s not gum grinning, titles don’t matter much when it comes to the quality of an album. It’s based mostly on how it sounds. That part she has covered. Even as you realize her poems are mostly just romantic ramblings, her style is enchanting enough to make them mean something.

It’s Jon Brion who directs the music, composed mostly of classical instruments you’re not used to hearing on a modern-day pop album like the violin and the cello. His soundscapes gloss what may have otherwise been mere Love songs with dreamy elegance; the kind that never really goes out of style. Highlights include I Know and Paper Bag.

my rating : 4 of 5

1999

audio review : Diamonds From Sierra Leone ( song ) … Kanye West ( featuring Jay-Z )

Jay-Z shines here. Part of it has to do with the grandiose way his protégé Kanye West introduces him and much of it has to do with the beat; an Indianish dance joint led by a Shirley Bassey song sample he (Jay-Z) is wise enough to acknowledge.

He uses too many bars for Memphis Bleek, but this is one of his best verses. West stays truer to the theme; a moral argument against diamonds cut to promote war in Africa. “These ain’t conflict diamonds,” he asks Jacob The Jeweler, “Don’t lie to me, man.”

my rating : 4 of 5

2005

audio review : Late Registration ( album ) ... Kanye West