SOUNDTRACK: ST. VINCENT-Masseduction (2018).
St. Vincent’s latest album seemed like a radical departure for Annie Clark. It seemed to be all synth–a transgression from her guitar prowess. But in fact it was a continuation of the sound that Clark generates with her guitar.
Her albums have always used synths. And her albums have always used effects on her guitars to create different sounds. They have just moved further along on this album.
“Hang on Me” opens the disc with drums and sound effects. The guitar comes in but it sounds like synths (like most of the album). Her voice is up front (It would have been very cool if it sounded like she was whispering in your ears). The song builds with more and more sounds. The processed guitar still sounds nothing like a guitar but you can tell from the way it is played that it is a guitar–which is pretty cool.
“Pills” is almost all dance–lots of drums and synth sounds (which may be guitar, who can tell). It’s the chorus, (the repeated pills pills pills) that really grabs you. The guitars that come through have a very Prince-like feel (and the sexual connection–pills to fuck) even when the roaring fuzzed out guitar solo comes blasting through it’s not unlike something Prince would have done. When the second part of the song comes in–absolutely quiet compared to the chaos that came before (S. assumed it was a different song) it has a beautiful melody and really showcases Annie’s voice nicely. The two parts are so very different and yet both are really catchy in their own way.
“Masseduction” is the most poppy song on the record (and probably of her career). It starts again with drums and Annie’s whispered vocal (again mixing her right in your ears would have been very intense). Then comes there’s the big chorus of echoed vocals singing “mass seduction” with roaring guitars underscoring everything (even though this album feels very un-guitar there are noisy guitars galore on it, they’re just buried underneath everything).
Chanted vocals and programmed synth open up the fast-moving “Sugarboy.” I love that the riff from “Los Ageless” is presented her in much faster and more staccato and mechanical way. This song has a great, catchy chorus.
“Los Ageless” was the second single off the album and the dancey beat and synth sounds were quite a shock when the song came out. For this one, her voice is mixed right in the middle of your head, which is very cool. But it’s the “how can anybody have you” part that is so incredibly catchy and wonderful. There’s not a lot of guitar on this song until the third verse in which all the synths drop out and you get a nasty guitar playing behind the verse–once again so inorganic but so interesting.
“Happy Birthday Johnny” is a beautiful piano ballad that showcases a great melody and lovely vocal from Annie.
“Savior” features a slinky guitar line with bits of wah-wah on it (slighty porn-y to be sure, especially given the topic of the song). The bridge picks things up and with each subsequent verse more and more is added (backing vocals, big drums and sound effects). It’s when the song gets to the third part, the ‘pleeeease” that it totally soars.
“New York” is another piano song, this one with more dance beats in it and the rather graphic “you’re the only motherfucker in the city who can stand me” for a chorus (odd choice for first single). The bridge “I have lost a hero” just soars out of the piano section in a very cool way–the juxtaposition is outstanding.
After the quite ending of New York the noise and electronica of “Fear the Future” comes as quite a shock. It’s practically a wall of noise before and abrupt ending
“Young Lover” is quieter and sounds a lot more like early St. Vincent songs. The music is spare–thumping drums and washes of music. But that first chorus grows very loud–crashing electronic drums and soaring vocals. The amazing part comes toward the end as Annie hits some incredibly high notes and then caps it off with a high note that gives me chills every time I hear it. The fact that she duplicated it live was just staggering.
“Dancing with a Ghost” is 46 seconds of waves of synths (or guitars) that I never quite realized was its own song. It almost segues into “Slow Disco” which is a quiet song with strings and Annie singing. When the harmony vocals come in it builds the song nicely. Then someone (Annie?) sings a recurring motif of “don’t it beat a slow dance to death.” It’s my least favorite song on the album and the one she has now made two (slower) remixes of.
That feels like it should end the album, but there is one more song, the dramatic “Smoking Section.” With a husky voice Annie sings of getting stomped out and screaming “let it happen, let it happen, let it happen.” The strings build dramatically until a loud three note riff introduces the second part of the song.
This album is pretty polarizing, even though it is St. Vincent through and through.
[READ: October 3, 2018] “The Rise and Rise of Annie Clark”
The previous story that I read by John L’Heureux was also about the Catholic church. That one was the story of Jesuit Priesthood, circa 1954, and a man trying to join.
This one is also based around the Catholic church circa 1950. The subject is very different, but with the same questioning attitude.
Annie Clark is a middle-aged woman in the 1950’s . I’m unclear where this is set. At first I thought France, but that is unlikely. so somewhere in the States, but I have no idea where.
Since the end of WWII, Annie knows that women were the real winners–women are taking charge of their lives.
But Annie is Catholic and must proceed slowly.
The story opens with Annie in a cafe eating some apple pie and insisting on getting a larger slice of cheese. She thinks to ask for a “slice of cheese big enough for me to see,” but she feels badly for the waitress, a young woman much like she herself was 25 years earlier.
Annie’s freedom is directly inhibited by her family. Her screaming, wild, unmanageable children and drunken husband. When she left for mass this morning “they were still quarreling over their Wheaties, so God only knows if they got to school on time. They hate school and are rude to the nuns.”
It’s a Catholic school which Annie insisted upon. All of the teachers speak French, which her children do not know.
Annie has great sympathy for nuns except for the mean ones. For Annie applied to be a Daughter of St Joseph when she was young. She was assigned a month’s kitchen trial under Sister Hildegard. Hildegard and Annie had a war of wills over a 20 pound bag of sugar in the basement (Annie fell down the stairs). It ended with Annie stating, “you can go to hell and get it yourself.”
She came out of the convent and fell into the arms of Will Hébert (even though she remained in her is Irish hear Annie O’Flaherty Clark) and she had four children in the next seven years. Then she told him that that was it, she would have sex no more. And Willy immediately took to the drink.
Her eldest David was recently accused of stealing candy bars from LeDuc’s grocery. And that is the last straw for her.
She still believes fervently in God and she wonders if her life is just one big trial for her–a test to prove that she is worthy of more–that she can handle it. She decides to go and ask a priest. She goes to thee Irish priests at St Patrick’s (not the French ones). She knows how rectories work, that you can’t just walk in and talk to a priest, but she does so anyway and she meets with Father O’Malley.
He half listens to her and then quickly dismisses her with some kinds words. She can’t believe she got such a quick brush off, but she wont give up easily. Upset, she goes to the movies and watches Jezebel–she thoroughly disapproves of it and Bette Davis. This makes her late getting home. When she gets home she makes some pasta and over boils it. Her nightmare children come running in for food and proceed to mock her in English and a little French
“We’re having merde for dinner.”
Finally Willy comes home from his job (he is a chef at a pub, where he drinks most of his wages). But he walks in with well done spaghetti and saves Annie. She is “grateful and resentful at the same time.”
She decides to spend the night with her sister, Millie. Millie has two angelic children and a loving husband. He is off in New York even though Millie should be resting. Millie has had two miscarriages and is currently pregnant.
Annie regales Millie with tales of woe all of which just make Millie laugh. Annie’s two youngest children asked a woman “Hey lady, you want an enema?” (the reason why is hilarious).
Then she starts talking about religion. She asks Millie is she has ever thought about the stigmata–what it’s like the first time it happens.
“No I never think of that. For God’s sake Annie talk of something real.”
Annie says, “I thin I wasn’t meant for marriage. I was meant to be a nun.”
“I believe you tried that once before,” Millie says, bitchy like Bette Davis.
Annie continues that she’s made up her mind, she is leaving them “It’s my heart. I’ve got a condition and I’m going to Florida for a rest.”
Millie asks if she finally got a sign from God, “Was it a sign pointing to Florida? A sort off divine traffic sign?”
Annie will never forgive Millie. This is the end.
Annie leaves the next day. Her note was brief: “Bad heart. Gone to Florida.” She leaves Father O’Malley a longer note trying to make him feel bad and asking him to look after her family.
Next time we see Annie, she has been Annie in Florida for a couple of months working as a housekeeper at a hotel. She is called into the office and told that she is going to be let go–she has been accused of stealing. The owner knows it wasn’t her–it’s an old hotel trick for the guest to claim valuables were stolen to try to get something from the hotel. Annie is the unwitting victim.
Is this a sign to go back home? Can she face her home? He family? Her sister Does she have the strength? What about Father O’Malley will he judge her as well?
The end of the story is a miracle (literally) and the way it is reveals the miracle and how it deals with it is awesome.
This was a terrific story and I look forward to read more from John L’Heureux.
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