I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: SHE & HIM-Volume One (2008).

If you’ve seen Elf, and I’m sure you have, then you know that Zooey Deschanel has a beautiful voice. This record is a collection of her songs, sung by her with instrumentation by M. Ward, whose music I don’t know. The thing I learned about her voice is that it comes across as a very naked sound. It’s a little bit disconcerting in this day of vibrato and AutoTune, to hear someone singing so purely and with no affectation. That was evident in Elf, but it is really brought to the front here, where she sings an a capella track as well as some songs with limited instrumentation.

The bulk of the record is done in a style like 50s & 60s girl groups–The Ronettes, The Shirelles, and the Phil Spector wall of sound style. Her voice is suited perfectly to this kind of material. Even the recording style is very clean–one or two tracks sound like they could be from that era, just recently rediscovered. The rest of the songs have a country feel, a stripped down heartbreaky feel. And once again, her voice sounds great.

The whole collection just seems so sweet and unaffected, it’s almost impossible to believe that it was all written and recorded in 2008.

The only problem for me is that I don’t really like 60s girl groups, and I don’t really like country that much. So, really, I don’t like the CD all that much. I’ve given it a couple of spins, and it definitely overcomes the things that I don’t like about those styles. I even found myself singing two of the songs to myself this morning. It definitely deserves the great press, I just wish it was more my thing.

[READ: July 1, 2008] “Free Radicals”

The second Munro story in two days for me. And many of the elements are in place: idyllic, Canadian life, female protagonist, and a fairly unspeakable horror. In this case the horror has come from outside. Nita’s husband recently died, and Nita is left by herself. She always figued that she’d die first, what with the cancer and all, but she has unexpectedly survived her husband. The flashback to her pre-married life shows that she was the other woman, and she caused her husband’s first marriage to disintegrate. This is something about which she is wistful, not remorseful. But once they were married they were very happy together.

Now that he is dead, she spends her days going a bout a solitary routine, one which her friends and neighbors believe cannot be healthy for her. One morning she is startled from her routine by a man who has come to fix “the fuses.” I wondered when I read this if it was even possible that there would be someone who did such a job. It just seemed like an obvious set up for trouble. And so it is. The man pretends to do work in the basement and then comes back upstairs and holds Nita at knifepoint.

She is terrified, of course, and then thinks about the fact that she has cancer and will die anyway. She wonderes if she shouldn’t be scared. However, when the intruder shows her a photo of the reason why he is on the run, Nita really does become worried.

Rather than relying on the cancer as a bargaining pint, Nita relies on her past. She invents a story showing that she is just as dangeous as the invader. She retells her life’s story in which she is the cheated upon woman in the marriage. She was aware of the young temptress and she took action to prevent it. None of us is innocent.

The invader really only wants her car, he just wants to escape. But, Nita’s story gives him respect for her. And it is this that seems to spare her life. The story ends with a very satisfying conclusion.

It turns out to be one of Munro’s more fast paced and aggressive stories (which is of course relative). Even though its starts out slow, the increase in action stands in stark contrast to the rest of the story. I don’t know if she has many stories where things like this happen, but she handles it very well, and the style suits her.