Jemima
James - When You Get Old
The
thirteen song When You Get Old marks only Jemima James’ second album in a thirty
seven year span. Her first recording, At Longview Farm, is being released in
conjunction with it and it displays a clear evolution from her youthful 1979
compositions to When You Get Old’s much more stripped back, emotionally
sophisticated songwriting. She has become a singer of great understated nuance
in that time as well. Many of the songs on When You Get Old have a strong blues
pedigree and James proves herself quite capable of flexing some gritty muscle
in that direction without ever sounding unconvincing or else like she’s
straining for effect. Her smiling, sleepy vocals on some of the more
country-ish numbers stands in sharp contrast to the seriousness of some of the
lyrics but, like you can with blues, a certain amount of this pose can be
considered as part of the smiling to keep from crying school of singing. She
has great emotiveness in her voice and a canny talent for winding her singing
tightly into the arrangement of each song.
While
there’s some blues influence in this album, the most important strains laced
through this music are decidedly country and folk in origin. James doesn’t have
an overpowering voice, but none of the material on this album requires vocal
pyrotechnics. Instead, When You Get Old focuses much more on intimacy than
strength. The title song opens things and illustrates these points quite well. James,
as a songwriter, has a masterful way of delivering weighty sentiments with
smiling aplomb. She caresses each line out of her vocal chords with sensitivity
and never adopts an aggressive vocal posture. The second song “Magician”
emphasizes this strength. She revels in the literary possibilities that the
subject matter affords to her and gives listeners quite an inspired vocal
without, once again, ever overwhelming the listener.
This
song first philosophy continues for the duration of the album. “If I Could Only
Fly” will resonate with many listeners because James writes so well and, as a
vocalist, completely inhabits the imaginative landscape she creates with her
songs. “If It’s the End”, one of the album’s best songs, is perhaps the
pinnacle of her ability to marry low-key traditional country music with nuanced
lyrical material. The words, standing on their own, are serviceable and have
great strength, but it’s James’ ability to create subtext through her phrasing
that distinguishes songs like this from the rest of the pack. “Sensible Shoes”
revisits the opening song from At Longview Farm to great effect. The full-band
arrangement that powered the original is forsaken here in favor of the same
bare bones approach that characterizes the whole album.
“Golden
Boy” is a solid traditional country song with bluesy color shooting through the
arrangement. It’s a lyrically affectionate song, easily one of the album’s most
affectionate numbers, and James delivers it with great phrasing while still
avoiding any overt sentimentality. “Tennessee Blues” continues her exploration
of classic country musical textures infused with a blues influence and the
lyric, quite simple on the surface, gains much from another strong James vocal.
The restrained mid-tempo shuffle of “One and Only” has great drumming and
another top shelf performance from James’ collaborators. The album’s final
track, “Nothing New”, brings this artful album to a satisfying conclusion and
allows James a chance to perform a completely solo piece. When You Get Old
carries underrated power and panache in the same streamlined package and anyone
who loves folk, country, and a little blues will undoubtedly find this to be
one of the year’s best efforts in that vein.
8
out of 10 stars.
Montey
Zike
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