Thalia Zedek
You’re a Big Girl Now
Kimchee
You’re a Big Girl Now is sparser than much of what Thalia Zedek has previously recorded. While her haunting solo debut, Been Here and Gone made use of minimal rock instrumentations, with blues and folk undertones, her present effort is reduced to the bare essence. Opening appropriately with the heartache of “Everything Unkind,” Zedek sets the tone for the rest of the album: ‘Cause all the reasons I loved you never really made much sense/And I got tired of acting in my own defense . . . And I know you want to leave me/You want to go so far away/Where no-one cares about you, or knows your name.” You’re a Big Girl Now’s stripped down approach accentuates her visceral vocals that seem to ooze a sense of grievous dislocation. This is most poignantly articulated in an eerie interpretation of The Velvet Underground’s dirge about transexuality, “Candy.” Here, and throughout, each weary inflection of Zedek’s voice is protracted by the aching wail of a viola, or the spare minor chord phrasing of a piano. It is Zedek’s backing band’s ability to help give voice to her disconnectedness that makes this very short album so interesting. Harrowing is her take on the Bob Dylan song that gives this album its name where the soporific formula is a bit more rocked out (which is relative, of course), yet still disturbing. The album’s brevity is its sole fault, for when it is all over the listener is left wallowing in Zedek’s pain, masochistically yearning
Kimchee Records: http://www.kimcheerecords.com
