Reviews

Jolie Holland: Pint of Blood

Jolie Holland
Pint of Blood
(Anti-)
[Rating: 3 stars]

Like the lightning bug she sings about on Pint of Blood โ€“ in a hauntingly poetic image on the song โ€œGold and Yellowโ€ โ€“ Jolie Hollandโ€™s unusual voice can be both mesmerizing and easy to overlook. Like a flickering light, it unexpectedly swoops and increases in intensity, then recedes and fades, her words and diction slipping in and out of volume and urgency. Sheโ€™s spellbinding when sheโ€™s on โ€“ aided by her penetrating and often-literary lyrics. But when her singing meanders too long without focus, you forget sheโ€™s there โ€“ her energy dissipates and she blurs into background, leaving her dependent songs with nothing to do but await her return.

Her fifth solo album has a minimalist, stripped-down and live-sounding rock sound โ€“ sheโ€™s working with three guitarists, co-producer Shahzad Ismaily, Grey Gersten and Marc Ribot. โ€œAll Those Girls,โ€ the riveting opener, has minor-key chording slightly reminiscent of Neil Youngโ€™s โ€œHelpless,โ€ and the piercing electric guitar invigorates Hollandโ€™s singing. โ€œRemember,โ€ with its incessant Velvet Underground rock beat aided by shrewdly fiery guitar feedback, brings to the fore the albumโ€™s best lyric: โ€œIf you donโ€™t catch me when I fall for you, Iโ€™m going to have to remember how to fly.โ€

But not all the songs come at you with such forceful authority. In โ€œGold and Yellow,โ€ the electric guitar seems to be struggle with her vocal idiosyncrasies. And on โ€œThe Devilโ€™s Sake,โ€ Ribotโ€™s evocative, bare-bones bluesy electric accompaniment is too respectful โ€“ it leaves Hollandโ€™s voice to wander around, looking for musical firmament. But the album ends with a wonderful version of Townes Van Zandtโ€™s โ€œRexโ€™s Blues.โ€ The piano and Ribotโ€™s guitar allow her to explore and shape the vocal, pushing into Van Morrison mystical territory. Itโ€™s as if sheโ€™s trying to contact Van Zandtโ€™s soul itself out there in the atmosphere, using her probing, plaintive voice like a beacon.

When she makes a connection like that with her material, you can overlook a few that donโ€™t work as well.