The Boston Phoenix Best Music Poll Awards

CD Reviews

tUnE-yArDs | w h o k i l l

4AD (2011)

By DANIEL BROCKMAN | May 25, 2011

2.5 Stars

The human voice is often seen as a lonely thing, calling out unaccompanied in a cold and hostile environment. It is this property that has seen generations of vocalists enshroud themselves in bands in order to mask their loneliness and be part of a group thing, looking out the window at the sulking singer-songwriter all alone on a stool caterwauling to no one. Merrill Garbus, d/b/a tUnE-yArDs, a recent enchanter at our Brighton Music Hall, clearly is having none of that. Armed with a few delay pedals, a smattering of percussive devices, and a fucking ukelele, she creates a vocal army of one. Her continued veering into Afrobeat appropriation occasionally whiffs of Bobby McFerrin–ism, but fear not: especially on this, her sophomore outing, the sophisticated boom-bap and wall of rhythmic power pays off more often than it panders, especially on scorchers like "Bizness" and "Gangsta." It takes a certain amount of courage to make music that so closely skirts the outer edges of sheer annoyance, and indeed for some this music's lilting sing-song mixed with Garbus's propensity to shift from a Ladysmith Black Mambazo soothe to a blues mama yowl will prompt an instinctive grab for the "stop" button. But give it a chance: w h o k i l l may be strange on first pass, but only by its uniqueness, a music whose microgenre would disappear in a whiff were Ms. Garbus to have never stumbled upon it within her.

Topics: CD Reviews , Music, 4AD, folk, More

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