Apple’s fierce lyrics and beguiling voice have been my guide through battles with love and morose since her debut album, Tidal. I've heard some say her music is for man-bashing or it is feminist jargon...far from the truth. It is a rawness, rarely found in music – especially in a business where everyone says almost everything BUT what they mean. She has taken poetics to a place where it is not just selling albums, but also, openly selling her soul. Never an unoriginal key or metaphor composed in her songs. Her delicate fingers sound as though they slip across the piano effortlessly, releasing woeful and still powerful sounds, about the bane and wonder of every kind of love: intimate, maternal and even love for one’s self.
Fast As You Can, a rumbling confession of a scarred woman fighting a new romantic interest, makes the perfect soundtrack for love & war: “I let the beast in too soon, I don't know how to live without my hand on his throat; I fight him always and still…Fast as you can, baby run, free yourself of me, fast as you can. I may be soft in your palm but I'll soon grow hungry for a fight, and I will not let you win. My pretty mouth will frame the phrases that will disprove your faith in man…” (Some of my other favorites from her are Sleep To Dream, Criminal, Pale September, Shadow Boxer and Love Ridden).
Damien Rice came into my life just after graduating from college. Consumed by a romance that was inevitably doomed yet unrelenting, I heard the lyrics to Volcano and discovered Rice, a quiet artist with simple yet astounding words: “What I am to you is not real. What I am to you, you do not need. What I am to you is not what you mean to me. You give me miles and miles of mountains, and I'll ask for the sea.”I might just cry, right there in the park! I get shivers just thinking about it. This show is truly for those of us who secretly swoon and ache for passion and tragedy. Sometimes misery is our best friend, and who better to share that with than Apple and Rice, the devotees of heartache.
4 comments:
I meant to post this a long time ago when I first got the tickets...but I forgot! Sorry.
oh how i wish i was there!
fiona often plays in my car...actually, they might be your cds, ha.
she's got intriguing features in that pic.
Does anyone else think it's weird that you never see Fiona Apple and/or Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen in the same room at the same time??
For those of us who were unable to get tickets (read:uncool enough to attend), we'd love to know how the concert was. Great moments? Best song?
Curious: what's the female/male ratio at an Apple n' Rice concert? Granted, it isn't Lilith Faire where we might expect an 80/20 ratio for the ladies, still I wonder...(wouldn't it be a great venue for a het male to show off his sweet, sensitive n' vulnerable side?)
Hypothetically: Let's say you saw a mildly attractive bloke at the concert (e.g. a younger JFK, Jr.), seated on his quilted blanket with a few of his gal pals. He's obviously single. Between sets he was kicking around the hackey sack and he gave you a lusty gleam that spoke volumes.
But then let's say during "Shadow Boxer" you saw his eyes well up and he wiped away a few tears (nay, he slipped his glasses off and rubbed his nose and THEN wiped away the tears), be honest Blogger, wouldn't you think less of him? Just a little..?
Obviously you're saying, 'wow he seems like a really attractive guy on the surface, I'd consider dating him' but deep down you're thinking 'that's so revoltingly unmasculine, i'm a little unattracted'...lil' bit...? Lil' bit? be honest..
More importantly, how were the Port-A-Potty's?
[In the interest of full-disclosure, I did attend last summer's MIA/DJ Rekha Central Park Summer Concert Series show. And on that particular day there was a 60/40 ratio for the fems. I didn't cry, nor did I get any phone numbers. Although I did lock myself out of my apartment and had to sleep on a bench with my malodorously beloved homeless comrades on the upper west side...I never cried. Not once.]
You are right CT, sorry for the late review...
The show was excellent! Rice disproved my sensitive/romantic image of him and rocked out with the best of em'. Though, when Blower's Daughter played a hush came across the crowd. I've never seen an audience be so silent. Heather Graham walked into the crowd and sat down right in front of us! She is much prettier in person than she is on screen.
Fiona...she is a nutcase, but I love her. She has a piercing presence. My, is that girl angry. If I were a guy I'd wanna date her.
My favorite performances were Shadowboxer, Fast As You Can, Criminal and Its Not About Love. I was that chic in the crowd singing every line out loud :-)
On our way home we walked through Central Park in the dark. Quite an interesting experience...we got lost and ended up on the eastside. It would've been a waste of time if we hadn't run into Spike Lee!
As for the "sensitive man" question...ehh, I have to be honest, at the end of the day, I want a Man's Man. All that emotional, cry baby stuff is a turn off.
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