Jordan Pruitt - Permission To Fly
Aug. 13th, 2008 12:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
koganbotLiveblogging my first run-through of the new Jordan Pruitt album:
"One Love": Opening number is a disappointment, though the last alb had its share of similar tracks that didn't quite jell.
"My Shoes" is somewhat r&b, the arrangement getting in the way of her strength, which is the unobtrusive scratch and pang of her voice.
"In Love For A Day": I'd say the same for this one, except both song and she come across better. Pruitt is strangely square and low-rent even in comparision to the rest of Disney/Hollywood Records. (Reminds me of the first Tiffany alb in this regard, same not-on-top-of-it stab at various then-current styles with the stab and effort carrying its own accidental pizzazz, taking her beyond many of the people who were more state of the art/state of the culture.)
"Boyfriend" puts her voice front and center in a cheapo mysterioso setting. This one moves me, even with all the chintzy effects in the chorus. "So put your hips back in check/And try never to forget/My guy you're not going to get"!!! The chorus is kinda electro-Caribbean beats lifted from a flea-market and recorded with the beats accidentally spilling across the corrugated floor of a bus. First clear winner, with bizarre spizzes of cheerfulness bobbing up from within her basic pool of yearning.
"Unconditional": Nice bits of voice surrounded by strings and blah.
"I'm Gone": Jordan insists she's leaving, but hesitates, while an energetic synth treads massively like a tuba. Arrangement is simultaneously busy and spare; Jordan combines moxie and pain in that way of hers, adding squibs of harmonic feeling via double tracks. Second oddball track is also her second winner.
"Simple Things": Ballad that's given unnecessary dance beats. Goes for that easy feeling, but summery strings intrude too much. Works pretty well nonetheless.
"Permission To Fly": Scraps found on the disco floor. This is what I mean by low rent in a square-jawed building. When she ain't got no tears left she got nothin' to lose, so don't need no permission to fly. Voice goes gently in what would be the fireworks parts, the effect touching. She scores again with another improbable shot.
"The Way You Do The Things You Do": Speaking of improbabilities, on her last alb she got depth, uncertainty, and poignancy out of "We Are Family," now she cheerily tromps her way through this Temptations classic, using multi-tracks to create herself as a whole troop of troupers. Don't know yet if this scores, but it certainly nonplusses the competition.
"Secrets": A retro-hip, neo Andrews Sisters number which again she underplays sweetly while the music bounces along. I'd rate this a good solid hmmmm.
"I Wanna Go Back": Pretty singing, pretty song, the arrangement is standard, and this takes a long time to click; finally does.
"Always": Finally, a simple arrangement, her voice being beautiful, hopeful, tremulous; she harmonizes confidentally with herself in the chorus without negating the beautiful uncertainty. Scores.
So, four winners and another four or five potential growers. Jordan sings with feeling and subtlety and with glinting overtones, like Aly Michalka, but unlike Aly she's not a personality singer. I get the feeling that she's an A-level talent in a B-movie setting, but that the setting might be right for her, since big productions could get in her way.
"One Love": Opening number is a disappointment, though the last alb had its share of similar tracks that didn't quite jell.
"My Shoes" is somewhat r&b, the arrangement getting in the way of her strength, which is the unobtrusive scratch and pang of her voice.
"In Love For A Day": I'd say the same for this one, except both song and she come across better. Pruitt is strangely square and low-rent even in comparision to the rest of Disney/Hollywood Records. (Reminds me of the first Tiffany alb in this regard, same not-on-top-of-it stab at various then-current styles with the stab and effort carrying its own accidental pizzazz, taking her beyond many of the people who were more state of the art/state of the culture.)
"Boyfriend" puts her voice front and center in a cheapo mysterioso setting. This one moves me, even with all the chintzy effects in the chorus. "So put your hips back in check/And try never to forget/My guy you're not going to get"!!! The chorus is kinda electro-Caribbean beats lifted from a flea-market and recorded with the beats accidentally spilling across the corrugated floor of a bus. First clear winner, with bizarre spizzes of cheerfulness bobbing up from within her basic pool of yearning.
"Unconditional": Nice bits of voice surrounded by strings and blah.
"I'm Gone": Jordan insists she's leaving, but hesitates, while an energetic synth treads massively like a tuba. Arrangement is simultaneously busy and spare; Jordan combines moxie and pain in that way of hers, adding squibs of harmonic feeling via double tracks. Second oddball track is also her second winner.
"Simple Things": Ballad that's given unnecessary dance beats. Goes for that easy feeling, but summery strings intrude too much. Works pretty well nonetheless.
"Permission To Fly": Scraps found on the disco floor. This is what I mean by low rent in a square-jawed building. When she ain't got no tears left she got nothin' to lose, so don't need no permission to fly. Voice goes gently in what would be the fireworks parts, the effect touching. She scores again with another improbable shot.
"The Way You Do The Things You Do": Speaking of improbabilities, on her last alb she got depth, uncertainty, and poignancy out of "We Are Family," now she cheerily tromps her way through this Temptations classic, using multi-tracks to create herself as a whole troop of troupers. Don't know yet if this scores, but it certainly nonplusses the competition.
"Secrets": A retro-hip, neo Andrews Sisters number which again she underplays sweetly while the music bounces along. I'd rate this a good solid hmmmm.
"I Wanna Go Back": Pretty singing, pretty song, the arrangement is standard, and this takes a long time to click; finally does.
"Always": Finally, a simple arrangement, her voice being beautiful, hopeful, tremulous; she harmonizes confidentally with herself in the chorus without negating the beautiful uncertainty. Scores.
So, four winners and another four or five potential growers. Jordan sings with feeling and subtlety and with glinting overtones, like Aly Michalka, but unlike Aly she's not a personality singer. I get the feeling that she's an A-level talent in a B-movie setting, but that the setting might be right for her, since big productions could get in her way.
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no subject
Date: 2008-08-14 12:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-08-14 03:41 pm (UTC)(Not that this is relevant, but we had a discussion of gender-variable first names here, and I concluded that Jordan was the one with the most variability, with Kelly second but drifting feminine.)
no subject
Date: 2008-08-14 05:38 pm (UTC)