Word: difrancoã
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Depending on how you count them, Educated Guess is Ani Difranco??s twentieth album in less than 15 years. This is her first entirely solo record and the result is an album that takes Difranco??s trenchant, self-revelatory style and folds it over onto itself, producing music so intimate it would be uncomfortable, were it not for Difranco??s wry delivery. Spoken word poetry is woven into the album, giving it the feel of an open-mic coffeeshop after everyone else has gone home. Politics is unsurprisingly omnipresent, ranging from the subtle...
...album’s most striking element is its dense, chromatic musical textures. Guess may be some of Difranco??s most opaque work yet, full of tense, unsettling suspended chords that never quite resolve. There are no ballads like “32 Flavors” or angry acoustic diatribes. The prevailing mood is desolate and intensely introspective, as only Difranco can be. On the standout track “Bliss Like This,” Difranco chills out long enough for a jazzy quasi-love song in which she is as concerned with herself...
...DiFranco??s latest studio release finds her softening her unique style of urban folk to take on a more contemplative tone. A collaboration with the musicians who once made up her touring band, Evolve bears the excitement, energy and spontaneity of a live album, but still enjoys the polish of a finely tuned studio production...
...always with her work, Evolve derives its strength from DiFranco??s lyrics, acoustic pyrotechnics and soaring arrangements. The opener “Promised Land” grabs the ear with soft, open guitar chords and rich brass while Ani croons her standard worldly cynicism: “They say that the truth will set you free / But then so will a lie / It depends if you’re trying to get to the Promised Land / Or you’re just trying...
...spite of their separate themes, the two discs and the songs that make them up flow seamlessly into one another, effectively conjuring the illusion that the listener is actually at a concert. The band is brilliant and entirely in accord with Difranco??s intense and jazzy guitar playing style, while she fearlessly delivers her no-nonsense, thought-provoking lyrics...