Ani Difranco: Revelling/Reckoning

BY CHUCK COLMAN

Like many double albums, it feels like a journey through the mind of an artist rather than a concrete collection of songs. Most of this record is contemplative and introverted, serving primarily as a sketchpad for DiFranco to expound on her perceptions of the world. She examines human relationships with new insight and intensity, and instead of merely grazing over topics with clever-sounding generalizations, she puts her life under the microscope. The result is often simultaneously profound and heartbreaking. If her old fans fail to see the brilliance of the ideas presented here, it will be because most of them are simply over their heads.

While the lyrics are uniformly excellent, the music is a bit more hit-or-miss. DiFranco's idiosyncratic, percussive playing style has all but disappeared. Most of the songs are in the folk-jazz vein of her last several albums, her tenor guitar tastefully accompanied by piano, organ, and a wind ensemble. The most memorable tracks on Revelling/Reckoning are the ones that sound like her previous release, To The Teeth. In these songs, like "Marrow" and "So What," the trumpet, saxophone, and clarinet complement the jazz groove nicely. In other songs, like "Fierce Flawless," the swanky-sounding horn riffs feel out of place and sometimes flat-out bizarre. DiFranco is actually taking numerous musical risks, from the splashes of atonality in "Grey" to the spoken-word track "Tamburita Lingua."

DiFranco's voice is more weathered than ever, sounding strikingly like the muted trumpet accompanying her. It is also more expressive and powerful than it has ever been; she will sit on a word and drag it out, milking every consonant for maximum impact.

Revelling/Reckoning is not the album that would have made Ani DiFranco famous. What the young DiFranco of the East Village had was fierce, tactless grace. She hit us over the head with her wit. Now, she is gently inviting us into her mind to see how she thinks—and it would be absurd not to accept the invitation. (Righteous Babe)

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