Meredith is a die-hard Ani DiFranco fan; Ben hasn't heard her music much before. They decided to review DiFranco's 15th album, "Evolve," together.
BEN: The album resists a simple appraisal with remarkable spirit. In some ways, I should have suspected that. The artist herself has cast her juggernaut independent career in multi-colored lights. Attempts to describe her as a songwriter and feminist siren or poet of deeply personal politics or even acoustic folk demon seem to leave out an essential quality. The desire to describe DiFranco and her music in any but the most pliable terms is a sure way to miss the essence of her art.
On the title track, DiFranco proclaims her individuality: "So I walk like I'm on a mission/'Cause that's the way I groove/I got more and more to prove/It took me too long to realize/That I don't take good pictures/'Cause I have the kind of beauty that moves."
I'm not what you'd describe as an Ani DiFranco devotee. My prior exposure to her music was the doing of a seventh-grade girlfriend and went no deeper than "32 Flavors" and "Both Hands," songs that have been covered by other artists by now. Since then, DiFranco has been on a roll, following and reacting to the forces of her life, letting the styles of musicianship that support her fearless lyrics evolve. A reviewer is presented with the musical mileage that has shaped DiFranco on the one hand and the current release on the other. Both hands are important.
MEREDITH: When I first heard Ani DiFranco perform, I was in my junior year of high school, and she was on some late-night talk show. I ran out the next day to buy Little Plastic Castles. I have to admit that at first her unique musical style was difficult for my pop-influenced teen sensibility to identify with, but her words spoke to my heart. Since then, I've been a regular listener and my appreciation for her music has grown.
With each new album, she takes risks, both challenging herself as an artist and challenging her listener to join her on the journey. She keeps things interesting musically, but it always comes back to the words. Her talent for infusing lyrics with both a sense of personal reflection and social conscience allows her to connect with her audience while also demanding that they remain active and questioning.
On "Evolve," DiFranco demonstrates how successful she's been at honing this skill. She moves effortlessly from songs such as "Phase" and "Second Intermission," which harken back to her roots as an independent folk singer, to "Promised Land" and "In the Way," which are more jazzy and funky, and even to "Oh My My," for which she taught herself to play the piano. Yet with each song, she remains true and speaks to us about the frustrations of living in an imperfect world that both builds and breaks your heart with every step.
BEN: "Evolve" blends acoustic rock, jazz and funk. As a single musical statement it eludes classification and is the better for it. Backed by organ, drums, bass and a horn section, DiFranco seems at ease, layering self-assured vocal p hrasing on top of brown-sound acoustic licks on top of smooth brass arrangements. Together the tracks are like grown-up members of a large family -- they live their own lives but can't hide the family resemblance. Through the stuttering drum and bass groove of "In the Way," you can almost hear her smirking as she describes herself and a lover: "And every day we yell/Down each other's holes/Two slippery strippers/Swinging round two poles."
"Icarus," written in an older style and outshone by the album's more brilliant moments, mercifully gives way to the bluesy and expectant "Oh My My." "Evolve" reaches a halfway peak with the title track, reminiscent in vocal phrasing and erratic fretwork of early Dave Matthews; it'll stick in your head the way "What Would You Say" once did. After the Latin-influenced paranoia of "Here For Now," Ani excuses the band, reels in the album's energy and channels it into the dark, ten-minute poem-to-guitar "Serpentine." She leaves you no choice but to listen to its self-conscious gnashing of teeth on political themes. "Serpentine" is a reminder to go back and read the other track's lyrics, because nothing sung on "Evolve" is inconsequential.
MEREDITH: "Evolve" is a self-conscious album. In the past, each new album released seemed like a new phase in DiFranco's growth as a musician, a new way of approaching music and a new effort to defy definition. With this latest attempt, she seems more comfortable with her risks, and more aware that she is taking them. While fearlessly moving from style to style musically, lyrically she is contemplative, as if taking this opportunity to reflect on her career.
Moving from the fierce political commentary of "Serpentine" to the more self-critical "Here For Now," each song is unique, yet they are all are connected by consciousness of artistic identity. Her choices must have been deliberate. "Evolve" feels like an attempt to demonstrate her growth as an artist while remaining an individual, conscious of her role and her vulnerabilities.
