Mylène Farmer - Innamoramento

Released: 1999

Purchased: On SwapaCD, three or four years ago, I don't even fuckin' know anymore

Playthrough:

L'amour naissant - Absolutely gorgeous. I don't even have the words to describe it. I remember having to keep myself from listening to it too much when I got the album because I knew if I did, it'd lose its magic. One of Mylène's best ever vocal performances.

L'âme-stram-gram - Not one of her best singles, but she's got so many incredible singles that's not saying a lot. It's okay, but it comes across as filler to me (which is funny for a single).

Pas le temps de vivre - Elevator music, but again, really beautiful. It's easy to get lost in it, even though I barely remember it once it ends.

Dessine-moi un mouton - The album's big rock track. Definitely deserved to be a single in its own right, not off the live album.

Je te rends ton amour - Pas le temps de vivre, partie deux. But with a little twist melodically. It has the slightly off-kilter feeling of a lot of her earlier songs.

Méfie-toi - Also should've been a single. The closest the album gets to pure pop, but with a little undercurrent of anger.

Innamoramento - More elevator music. This one always irritates me because the chorus gets stuck in my head, but I can't remember quite how it goes.

Optimistique-moi - The spacey dance song, essentially this album's Dégénération. And creepy oedipal lyrics, just as we've all come to expect from Mylène.

Serais-tu là? - Has a very Cyndi Lauper-ish melody, but could do with being more memorable.

Consentement - Not much of a song.

Et si viellir m'était conté? - Er, likewise. I think I might've tuned out the album at this point, because I don't really remember any of the last three songs. I had to look them all up on iTunes and play the samples back.

Souviens-toi du jour... - Now, THIS one. I somehow completely forgot how incredible this song is. Vocals right up near the level of L'amour naissant, a beautiful melody, and perhaps the best production on the entire album. I remember listening to it on repeat for literally hours - it sends chills up my spine sometimes.

Mylenium - Basically a bonus track. It's just ambient electronic music and Mylène singing the word "innamoramento" over and over.

Verdict: I like this one a lot more than that review might lead you to believe, maybe because I do just tune it out when it gets boring (it's nice background music), or maybe just because its highlights are so incredible they outweigh the problem spots. It's been compared a lot to Ray of Light, which is appropriate in some ways, but I think it's more melodic and therefore more enjoyable, though it's also less electronic and more rock-oriented than Ray of Light. It's one of only two Mylène albums I can listen to from start to end without skipping anything (the other being its immediate predecessor, Anamorphosée), and unfortunately, at this point I can't see her topping it, since I haven't been too impressed by Bleu Noir and Monkey Me. This is one of those that I want to say every PJer should have. 9/10.

Standout: It's really close between L'amour naissant and Souviens-toi du jour, but I guess I ultimately have to go with the latter, not necessarily because I like it better, just because it's more accessible.

Kate Bush - The Red Shoes

Released: 1995

Purchased: Stole it from my dad a couple years ago.

Playthrough:

Rubberband Girl is Kate doing fun pop, which is unusual, so I love it just for that. It's a catchy, sing-along song; I just wish it didn't have the damn saxophone.

And So Is Love is typical Kate Bush - haunting, gorgeous ballad that works really well for winter.

Eat the Music is another fun pop song, and I don't understand why it came dead last in the singles rate. Now granted, the lyrics don't make a lot of sense - I saw someone on here say that they're about oral sex, and Wikipedia says they're "about opening up in relationships to reveal who we really are inside," but I don't know how well either of those interpretations holds up (especially the latter). I don't really care, though. It's not as though I Love It makes a lot of sense, but it's still a solid pop tune. Same goes here.

Moments of Pleasure is maybe my favorite Kate song. Definitely top three with Running Up That Hill and Sat in Your Lap. It's absolutely beautiful musically, mostly with lyrics to match. It sounds so dreamlike.

The Song of Solomon is basically filler, but it's still very pleasant. "Don't want your bullshit, just want your sexuality" is a classic Kate line.

Lily sounds more like Never for Ever-/The Dreaming-era Kate than probably anything else here, and though I'm not very fond of either of those albums, I do really like it. The chorus is oddly infectious.

The Red Shoes' lyrics don't really make sense without the plot of The Line, The Cross, and the Curve, but it's a fun little ditty nonetheless.

Top of the City comes off as a lesser Moments of Pleasure. It doesn't reach me in quite the same way, but it's similarly calming and wintry. It would be a really nice song to fall asleep to (no, no, no shade).

Constellation of the Heart feels, lyrically, like where Kate was trying to head with the whole damn album. Not something I'd choose to listen to, though.

Big Stripey Lie is the worst thing on the album. It's noise.

Why Should I Love You? is pretty fillery, but no less enjoyable for it. P'Nut probably stans for it.

You're the One is a fairly straightforward love song, which is unusual for Kate. Too bad it's boring.

Verdict: It's far from perfect, but it definitely doesn't deserve its poor reputation; I like it more than any of Kate's other albums. It would make a really good starting point for getting into Kate, given that it's more exoteric than most of her material. It's just too bad it falls apart at the end. 7/10.

Standout: Moments of Pleasure

Cyndi Lauper - Sisters of Avalon

Went back to a couple lost '90s releases by two underrated grrls today.



Released: 1997 according to Amazon, though I would have sworn it was 1996

Purchased: I'm thinking four, maybe five years ago? From Amazon's WarehouseDeals subsidiary, if I recall correctly.

Playthrough:

The title track is one of Cyndi's best "big pop songs," along with Girls Just Want to Have Fun and Money Changes Everything. Her moans on the verses are everything.

The Ballad of Cleo and Joe is a little hard to listen to at first because it's so beat-heavy, but not in a Steps four-on-the-floor kind of way. It's hard to explain. It just has a strong, uneven rhythm that's a little unsettling. Once I got a minute or so into it though, it clicked. The lyrics are apparently meant to be about a drag queen, but they could just as easily be about a transwoman or a non-binary person experimenting with their gender identity and expression, so it's close to my heart in that way.

Fall Into Your Dreams is also difficult to listen to, and doesn't really offer anything the way Cleo and Joe does.

You Don't Know is another of my favorite Cyndi songs. It's a big slice of True Blue-/Kiss-type pure pop but with pointed lyrics. There's just so much to love about it - the brilliantly subtle key change; its use of my favorite lyrical trick, using a word twice with different meanings ("Left suppresses right, right suppresses left, so what's left, and what's right?"). Should've been huge, but I guess the "bullshit" lyric probably put a damper on it.

Love to Hate is filler. I don't even have anything more to say about it.

Hot Gets a Little Cold is also pretty fillery, but it's really pretty.

Unhook the Stars is essentially a lesser Hat Full of Stars album track. Pleasant and passable, but nothing special.

Searching is very '90s house. Not altogether a good thing.

Say a Prayer is, dare I say, the worst song on the album. What's a melody, precious?

Mother is also somewhat lacking in the melody department, but it holds together better. It's okay.

Fearless was my original favorite. I love the lyrics, and though the production again renders it a little hard to play, I think the dulcimer adds that something to it.

Brimstone and Fire is about ... bisexuality? I think? It's a story song about meeting a woman and developing a relationship with her. The chorus is lax, but the verses are nice, aside from the occasional bad lyric ("I make spaghetti, she brings cake / I make spaghetti with tomato sauce because that's all I can make"... seriously?!).

Verdict: Far from Cyndi's best work, though it has a few gems. I think it's just way too of-its-time, and not straightforward enough for me, tunewise. 5/10.

Standout: You Don't Know