First full-length from riveting Oklahoma Americana folk singer
Samantha Crain is a Choctaw folk singer from rural Oklahoma whose vocal warble creates a sense of old-timey jazz. Her 2007 debut EP, The Confiscation, captured the feeling of an eerie walk along the canopied banks of a Southern Gothic river, and though this full-length isn’t as starkly foreboding, its imagery and lyrical meters remain striking and original. Crain’s gravitated from storytelling to poetic allusion, often leaving the tone and dynamics of her singing to communicate the pain, fear, confusion, despair and dislocation not transparently revealed in her words. The album is perhaps even more effective if you don’t resort to the lyric sheet. Crain continues to stretch her lyrics over the words’ rhythms, often repeating phrases in a trailing fog of lost thoughts or exclamation of suddenly realized memory. The Shivers’ Americana basics (guitar, bass, harmonica and drums) are augmented with touches of mandolin, trombone and mini-moog, remaining rustic and restrained; the slow-to-mid tempos are broken only once for the post-punk rockabilly shuffle and twang of “Bullfight (Change Your Mind).” Crain’s voice remains mystically compelling, and though her new songs haven’t the thick atmosphere of The Confiscation‘s, they’re still full of memorable images and riveting twists. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com] 