“orton_beth”
Beth Orton
Central Reservation
Arista
Beth starts off wistful, wispy, a little raspy (not in a trendy way, but not incredibly original sounding), pining, some more pining, some moody jazzy slurry lounge, a touch yodelish. This turns into an olio of k.d. Lang, Bonnie Raitt, and Rickie Lee Jones. There’s lilting piano lines over the lightly brushed sparkling acoustic guitar. Ice with chimes and strings, but leave it organic and serious sounding. Beth is not mean, not overtly angry in her observations, she sports sort of a sad but firm and objective pout.
The arrangements, delivery, and songwriting are fairly traditional – no surprises here. The production is a sparser, less energetic Robbie Robertson sound. She gets pretty mellow and personal towards the end, but don’t despair – there’s one more lite-groove remix of the title track thrown in.
Arista Records, 6 West 57th Street, New York, NY 10019-3913
