Balm in Gilead

I’ve been trying to figure out my draw to artists like Rickie Lee Jones, and in general my draw to late-career entries of middle-aged lady singer-songwriters. I think it has something to do with the requisite gay obsession with older women, who seem to be living proof that being weathered by life makes you smarter and beautiful in a better way, or at least resigned to your quirks and insecurities. In these albums I often find myself fast-forwarding through my own life and looking back compassionately on some of the stupid things I obsess over right now, which in turn makes the idea of getting older not so bad. Also, these albums almost always make me feel hungry in the womb. RLJ’s Flying Cowboys, which I read as a gorgeous, mostly upbeat paean to motherhood and which I had on repeat through the entirety of my mom’s illness, usually makes me cry. Though I’m probably more susceptible to this kind of thing than others, I have such a weakness for parent-child songs. I fall prey to this brand of romanticizing far more than I do in songs about, like, real romance.

I’ll try to keep this brief, as I doubt I’ve made any RLJ converts at this blog: Balm in Gilead, Rickie Lee Jones’s newest album, is exquisite. Its release coincides with her 30th year in the business and her daughter’s 21st birthday, and it’s a gorgeous, impressionistic survey of her life’s sweep. Her last album, Sermon on Exposition Boulevard, was slightly more experimental—a loose interpretation of the words of Christ. Balm manages to develop some of the spiritual themes explored there (especially the dirge-like "His Jeweled Floor" and “Eucalyptus Trail,” a reworking of “A Face in the Crowd” from her 2003 album The Evening of My Best Day—yup, I caught that). And then of course in the pairing of “Wild Girl,” an epistolary-type song to her daughter on the eve of her twenty-first birthday, and “The Moon Is Made of Gold,” a lullaby her father wrote, we have her beatnik treatment of parenthood, which is forgiving without being idyllic, reflective without being chummy. “Bonfires” is also a nice number, similar to one my other favorites, “Stewart’s Coat,” in that it’s a sad, sad love song with mostly just voice and guitar.

I love her harmonies on this album. Her harmonies, in general, are like the brass section of a jazz band, where there’s the illusion of layers and layers of voice and an ever-present but hardly discernible dissonant note. If you’ve never listened to “We Belong Together,” then you are in for a treat—it’s a storm that seduces you and then beats you up. But on Balm the harmonies are looser, kind of plucky, like a crochet blanket that has some holes in it and is fraying at the edges, and it works really, really well. Especially in “Old Enough,” her duet with Ben Harper, and on some of the other numbers with Vic Chestnut and Alison Kraus.



I am trying not to make this album sound like it’s her "last" album (even as I'm doing it myself, I still think it's annoying when the songs of artists who are not young are described by reviewers as a resignation to or revolt against death), but something really pretty happens in the last song, that does sound kind of like a resignation:

A child on Bayless Street
Left there by myself,
And she’s waiting there to meet
All the people we’ve become.

You can sing about "life" or you can choose against it. But if you are going to, I like this interpretation.

It turns out her Carnegie Hall show—billed as her 30th anniversary concert—has been postponed until she figures out exactly how to structure it. From her website:

Rickie Lee Jones has announced that she will be performing her 30th Anniversary show in two acts. The first act will focus on selections throughout her 30 year catalog and songs included on her new, critically acclaimed album, Balm in Gilead, while the second act will be a performance of her legendary 1981 album, Pirates, in its entirety. Very special guests who have collaborated with Jones throughout her career will be added to the performance and will be announced soon. In order to make preparations for this unique appearance, the originally scheduled date of December 7th has been postponed until early 2010 with new concert information to be announced soon.

You take your time—I'll be there when you're ready!