Cover of Actor, released on 4AD in 2009
If I may indulge in some cred wankery for a moment, I’d like to point out that I’ve been a follower of Annie Clark’s from way back. No, no. I mean, way back. Before she recorded under the name St. Vincent even. Early 2004.
It turns out that Annie Clark went to high school with a college friend of mine, who talked up Ms. Clark’s talents and recommended that I review her EP for KVRX. However, Hollie also had another dark-haired, musically-inclined friend named Annie who I got drunk with at a party. This led to a rather embarrassing exchange between myself and Ms. Clark where I wrote a babbly testimonial on her Friendster page (remember Friendster, kids?) and . . . well . . . she was quick to point out that I got the wrong Annie.
That said, she was also quick to send me her three-song EP, Ratsliveonnoevilstar, which I promptly reviewed and put into rotation. I don’t think it got a lot of spin, but I wrote a glowing review of it. In it, I really got a sense for her love of shimmery strings, idiosyncratic and minute production, coy but confrontational lyrics, and putting her rich voice front and center.
Of course, her interim between this period and her debut as St. Vincent is well-documented. She played with folks like The Polyphonic Spree and Sufjan Stevens, and I also caught her behind the cello at a Castanets show during SXSW 2k6. But when she finally released Marry Me in 2007, I was enlivened to hear all the promise I heard on that EP, distilled and glorious.
Cover of Marry Me, released on Beggars Banquest in 2007; photo taken from freewilliamsburg.com
Point is, while she may not remember me, I always believed in her.
And I still believe in her, because her sophomore release, Actor is wonderful. My dear friend Kristen hipped me to a certain national public radio station that was premiering it, and I haven’t been able to stop listening to it. And I was already in love with many of these songs, which I heard during SXSW 2k9, as I was fortunate enough to see her put on a delightful show at Central Presbyterian.
Still of St. Vincent performance at Central Presbyterian, found on Flickr
There’s a lot to love on Actor. For one, there’s her voice. As a choirgirl mezzo-soprano, I appreciate the hell out of her swoony, supple alto. In fact, I can pretty much guarantee that high school me would have been all about St. Vincent. I also love her inherent properness — the girl’s diction is as immaculate as her posture and guitar playing — and how it creates an interesting tension with her frank, wryly sexy lyrics (a favorite of mine is the first line off opening track “The Strangers” — “Lover I don’t play to win/For the thrill until I’m spent,” but there are plenty more).
In addition, she’s a fan of vocal loops, doubling and tripling and quadrupling her voice until there is an entire chorus of Annie Clarks echoing, harmonizing, dialoging, and sometimes completing trains of thought for itself. I believe this to be a feminist act — using one’s voice as an instrument, noise, an assertion of the self, and an acknowledgement that it can be many different things at once, while still residing in the same throat.
On that tack, I love Ms. Clark’s production sensibilities. I put her in ownership specifically, as she meticulously helms her own recordings, serving here as co-producer and playing many of the instruments herself (homegirl did go to Berklee, after all). Her songs are luminous and exquisitly crafted, characterized by either jarring, exciting spurts of guitar feedback and distortion (“An Actor Out Of Work” and “Marrow” especially) or building, layer by layer and wave upon wave into bottomless sonic structures (the one-two punch of “Party” and “Just the Same But Brand New” do this nicely for me). But she owns them. Just watch her:
Thus, one of the main things I love about Ms. Clark is her assuredness. I wouldn’t fuck with the woman behind “An Actor Out of Work,” no matter her deceptive politesse, would you?
If this album isn’t much of a departure from her debut, I think it might be because she already has a very clear take on who she is as both an artist and as a young woman. It’s evident in her sturdy voice, her steady hand guiding the production, and her direct yet candid, florid lyrics. Even when her lyrics point to a very mid-20s, female sense of doubt and uncertainty (a sense many of us can identify with, I’m sure — listen to “Party,” “Save Me From What I Want”), there’s little doubt that Ms. Clark knows exactly what she wants and will learn more and share with us as she grows older. At 26, she’s already gotten a pretty good start to figuring it out. At 25, I can’t wait to hear more from her.
Annie Clark looks ahead, though slightly off-center
