Adele, 21
So much has been said about the big British music boom, but
Duffy’s drab sophomore album was D.O.A. and Amy Winehouse drank herself into
oblivion. But Adele Adkins, with the wowing voice and girl-everyone-likes
appeal, sings like she’s here to stay on her post-19 release. Taking off two
years after delivering her debut (the title represents the age at which she
wrote it), 21 reflects a tumultuous split that left her with a broken heart
and 11 songs, all done-up by a slick team of Top-40 producers. The blitzing
first, "Rolling in the Deep," has thunderous bite as its acoustic guitar bursts
into a surging old-school soul song with some mad vocals ripping into her
ex-lover: "Go ahead and sell me out and I’ll lay your shit bare." Tell us how
you really feel, Adele. And, well, she does, either trying to shake love’s
memories on "Set Fire to the Rain" or, with "Turning Tables," walking away from
a wrecking relationship. Wronged-woman balladry is the album’s primary pursuit,
with numbers like "Take It All," featuring a stunning bridge and choir; an
intimate bossa nova cover of the Cure’s "Lovesong"; and showstopper "Someone
Like You," a wrenching, repeat-worthy torch song with enough conviction
penetrating her colossal wail to crush you into itty-bitty pieces. It’s the
voice of a classic in the making.
Grade: A-
Lucinda Williams, Blessed
Three decades in and Lucinda Williams still isn’t letting you down
easy. 2007’s self-reflective West grieved her mother’s death, and though its
aggressive follow-up, Little Honey, served as a nice breather, she’s back to
ripping into you with her 10th album. Suicide is the subject of "Seeing Black,"
but it doesn’t sound as sad as it should. It’s confused and inquisitive, asking
why and how over Elvis Costello’s driving guitar licks. Hauntingly portraying
the familial horrors of war, "Soldier’s Song," however, shoots right through
you. Both are among her best work, up there with tracks off her career
benchmark "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road." "Kiss Like Your Kiss" is too with the
transcendent beauty of its romantic evocation, one rich with imagery and a
sweetly restrained Williams singing as if she’s not drunk. That husky slur,
however, is still one of the Americana legend’s finest assets, and it works
well when she snarls on "Buttercup," a blistering bluesy rocker, and while
piping over a grungy guitar rollick on "Convince Me." She doesn’t have to
convince us; the songs, from "Don’t Know How You’re Livin’" to the powerful
"Copenhagen," do so on their own, as Williams sounds wiser, like she’s finally
ready to look out instead of in. Years of heartbreak will do that to you.
Grade: B+
Also Out
Lykke Li, Wounded Rhymes
"Dance while you can" is the lyrical creed off one of the best
cuts, "Love Out of Lust," from the Swedish chanteuse’s follow-up to 2008’s
Youth Novels. But these aren’t foot-shuffling songs. Even if they are
electro-retro, they’re chilly as ice – achy, wallowing and absolutely
mesmerizing, much like her haunting, career-powering "Possibility" from the
Twilight soundtrack. "Unrequited Love" is a girl-group song in slo-mo whose
sadness mounts because of her little-girl singing; it’s a brilliant bummer. On
Wounded Rhymes, Lykke Li makes a breakup sound beautiful, especially with the
ditty Duffy would kill for, "Sadness is a Blessing" – something you’d believe
if you heard this album.
Teddy Thompson, Bella
It’s a voice you’ve heard before. On the Brokeback Mountain
soundtrack. In Rufus Wainwright’s band. But the offspring of legends Linda and
Richard Thompson is still flying under the radar despite his genius, which is
potent on his fifth album – one that employs delicate strings that push out
into his rock-country-folk underbelly. His songwriting, about being in and out
of love, is spot-on, but the real sell is his billowy pipes. They blow in rich
caresses, showering over heartbreakers like the goodbye-lover lament "Take Care
of Yourself" and the ode-to-hopeless-romantics "Gotta Have Someone." That
someone is Teddy Thompson.