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Nellie
McKay - Get Away From Me (Columbia/Sony)
Released:
February, 2004
Okay, I picked this one up at
Tower Music because of the Mary Tyler Moore-ish photo, and the Parental
Advisory on the cover. They don't go together. I made a note of the name,
and looked Ms. McKay up on
allmusic.com. She's another youngster...19, at last count. I'm
beginning to detect a pattern in my musical tastes lately.
So I figured ten bucks at MusicMatch (best cover art is at walmart.com,
personal use and all) - what have I got to lose? This is a two-disc set if
you buy it in the store. It fits on a single disc if you download it.
Ms. McKay's style is eclectic, and cabaret, and all over the place. Think
Tom Lehrer with a mouth, and female, and...young.
And talented. Ohmygosh. Talented. Angry, political, unfocused, but
talented.
This would have been a better ten-cut album. There are four or five cuts
that just fall flat to me. "Clonie" is one. So is "It's a Pose," seeming
to have that "...everything bad in the world can be blamed on men" tone.
The message is that men are pigs, and if you don't seem like a pig, you're
faking it to get laid. On the other hand, that same tone works on "Won't U
Please B Nice," which is so cleverly done - "If we part, I'll eat your
heart/Won't you please be nice?"
"The Dog Song" and "Ding Dong" are my two favorites - both about animals,
in distinctly different ways. Ms. McKay says she's a member of PETA, which
says a lot to me. It suggests that she has better relationships with
animals than with people. Nothing a few years of therapy or a
healthy dose of reality wouldn't knock out. Yeah, we're all screwed
up. Get over it.
"I Wanna Get Married" is a
great piece of cynicism. "Change The World" is just a hoot.
Here's the problem. I'm sure her cabaret show (and it appears those are
the venues Ms. McKay plays) is great. But you've got to listen to the disc
several times to get it all. The clever lyrics, the political and social
commentary, the anger - It just all goes whizzing by so fast.
Buy the whole damn disc...spend the ten bucks like I did. Listen to 'em
all. Listen to 'em all again.
Your response to all of it will say a lot about you. I don't agree
with all of the commentary, or the politics, or the tone. But we
need voices like this, if for no other reason than for me to appear to be
more in the political center.
Pay attention to this young woman's next album. But one disc,
please.
  Two
and a half microphones (out of four)
- Doug Boynton
(06/25/04) |
