ALBUMS
RECORD OF THE MONTH ANGEL OLSEN MY WOMAN
On her second album, 2014’s Burn Your Fire for No Witness, Angel Olsen decided that she wasn’t merely the artist she was on her first, 2012’s far more delicate Half Way Home. And now, on third record My Woman, she’s decided she’s not comfortable with just being what she was on its more boisterous rocker of a follow-up either. This is excellent news because, although artists who exhibit a notable change from album to album these days are rare, historically it’s always those ones who’ve been the most interesting. And Angel Olsen is a mesmerising songwriter, Jagjaguwar // September 2nd despite going around with only a pretty standard rock band set up for accompaniment. That’s a rare skill nowadays, too. Stand Out Tracks: Sister Olsen’s often misleadingly simple lyrics are lent a Shut Up Kiss Me complexity by her far from straightforward delivery, and the Intern ensuing squall in which she cloaks her carefully-chosen, Never Be Mine pithy sentiments. The gritty, melodic meanness of the Live: KOKO, October 17th excellent ‘Shut Up Kiss Me’ belies any romantic intentions, while starting number ‘Intern’ – whose opening gambit, Online: @AngelOlsen perhaps tellingly, gently berates a singer "going through the angelolsen.com motions as you sing your song" – lays it on the line over a cool synth backing that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Blood Orange record. Some tunes, such as the sparse and prettily despondent ‘Heart Shaped Face’, or the lilting lament of ‘Never Be Mine’, are arranged as if space has been left for some wall of sound-style production, only for Olsen to have ultimately found the blueprints preferable. My Woman has built into it gaps through which your mind can wander, but the magnetic pull of Olsen’s voice is enough to ensure attention is never fully truant. The longest, most spacious song here is also the best. For nearly eight minutes, ‘Sister’ does everything you want from a minimal rock ballad (and nothing more), and if anyone exists in a middle ground between The Velvet Underground’s ‘Pale Blue Eyes’ and Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rhiannon’, this is what they’re singing. Like the similarly lengthy, brooding wonder of the penultimate ‘Woman’, it displays the songwriting skill of someone who knows that ominous crescendos, lurking over the horizon but never actually materialising, are just as effective as those that hit right where they should. Yes, among the encroaching synths and gentle flourishes of production there are some respectful nods to classic rock (but hey, it’s classic, and it rocks). However, though an often wistful affair, the feeling here is not of nostalgia, but of pushing forward. You won’t have figured Angel Olsen out after spending time with My Woman any more than you had her pegged before, which one presumes is the point – that way, she can do whatever she likes on the next one. Thomas Hannan