Daddy's Home＜Warm Gray Vinyl/限定盤＞

Starting with St. Vincents self-titled 2014 album, Annie Clarks artistic progression could be best described as a sharpening: Her sounds grew crisper and more angular, her lyrics ever more pointed. This approach peaked on MASSEDUCTION, which reflected a white-knuckle grip on image and identity in its high-definition pop. Control, or lack of it, is also a vital element on Daddys Home. Using her fathers return from jail for white-collar crime as a jumping-off point, Clark explores moral grey areas on songs that are as diffuse as her past few albums were taut. Her musical world-building remains as impressive as ever: Drawing on early-70s sounds introduced to her by her father, she pays homage to a more permissive time as she traces the best and worst things carried through the generations. Clarks version of the 70s is filled with so many allusions it should have footnotes; alongside the bubbling Wurlitzers and Mellotrons, she name-drops John Cassavetes and Candy Darling. While the swaggering single Pay Your Way in Pain pays homage to David Bowies Fame and Live in the Dream is a swirling tribute to Pink Floyd, not all the references are cooler than cool. On My Baby Wants a Baby, which finds the songs protagonist admitting they want creative accomplishment more than a child, Clark borrows the melody from Sheena Eastons 9 to 5 (Morning Train) (another song about the obligations of relationships) and a spangly sitar-mimicking guitar last heard on a B.J. Thomas single. Hearing Clark try on the albums bell bottoms and leather vest vibe is entertaining, but though the musical lineage of Daddys Home may be clearer than on any of her previous work, the same cant be said of its lyrics. With the notable exception of Somebody Like Mes vulnerability, Clarks songwriting remains emotion-adjacent instead of directly confessional. She delivers the albums tenderest songs in the second person (...At the Holiday Party) or to long-gone icons (Candy Darling). On the wry title track, she brings a little levity to the situation while pondering its deeper ramifications (Where can you run when the outlaws inside you?), continuing the concealing and revealing at which shes always excelled. Clark also revisits her own artistic past as well as her musical and familial influences. Shes not mellowing with age -- Downs brittle revenge-funk proves otherwise -- but the album is defined by its introspective tracks like The Melting of the Suns slow-motion tribute to female truth-tellers like Joan Didion, Marilyn Monroe, Nina Simone, and Tori Amos that also features some of Clarks most inspired guitar playing, and The Laughing Man, a sardonic ballad that recalls Actors Disneyfied dystopian reveries. Like the albums of the era it was inspired by, Daddys Home takes time to unfold in listeners imaginations. Its much more of a mood than anything else in her body of work, but its hazy reconciliation of the good and bad of the past makes it as an uncompromising statement from her as ever. ~ Heather Phares

ジャック・アントノフをプロデューサーに迎えた約4年ぶりの新作は、父親の出所にインスパイアされたもので、全体的に60年代末～70年代っぽいサイケ・ポップやソウルの情緒を転写したような魅力的な彩りを備えた一枚に。プリンス～ベック風味も薫るグラム・ファンク"Pay Your Way In Pain"をはじめ、埃を払ったら古い宝石が出てきたような優美さがある。過去作と比べても格段に楽しめる傑作。
bounce (C)轟ひろみ