Tanya Donelly has many talents, but first and foremost, she's a beautiful singer. And there are times on her new album when all you really hear is that voice. The album's first single, "The Storm," may be her best ever vocal performance: the lines unfold like a bridge spanning a river. Majestic yet varied, she can sound so real-- a stark jolt, a breathy pause-- that the high points become that much more angelic. And she still writes those weird but powerful lyrics: "You have carbonated my bloodstream" is freakishly romantic, followed by the strength in vulnerability of "when I stumble, it will be under your spell"-- the chorus then yielding to a stretched note that drifts like clouds on a cold Halloween night.
There is a band on this album, but it's just an expensive, perfect frame that you put around the picture-- it's best when least noticed. And that's one of the problems with Beautysleep. Five years have passed since Donelly's last album-- the poppier but less consistent Lovesongs for Underdogs-- and she has put down her guitar for now, leaving almost all axe duties to her husband Dean Fisher. Fisher and the others are like studio session players for a country singer: simpatico but anonymous. There are nice touches to the album's sound, like the perfectly moody organ on "Life Is But a Dream." But I had to look at the liner notes to find out that the deep voice shadowing "Moonbeam Monkey" belongs to the late, great Mark Sandman from Morphine. This duet between Boston's greatest high and low voices is a milestone, but it would be nice if Sandman were easier to hear.
Donelly gives us some menacing and bizarre songs, such as "Moonbeam Monkey" or "Wrap-Around Skirt"-- "This world is a fickle young girl/ It's high time we married her off/ How about to gassy old Jupiter." Sure, why not? But at its least energetic, it falls into "adult alternative" territory: it's not background music, but it could be treated that way. Donelly is extremely, consistently happy on Beautysleep, and it may take a few listens to single out and sink into "Another Moment," or the erotic home and hearth (and killer chorus) of "The Wave"; and while "Keeping You" is a strong single, it feels like another victory lap on an album that already has several. The joy of domesticity warms some great moments: that opening heartbeat that reminds us of Donelly's motherhood, or the assurance of "The Night You Saved My Life": "Now I sit with my babe at my breast/ I was never this good at my best/ Never higher." But by the third or fourth ballad, she's made her point.
Part of me misses her guitarwork. But I can accept that the album has a calmer sound-- and anyway, so few of you bought Belly's criminally underrecognized second album, King, that you can grab it now and compensate for Beautysleep's lack of hypercatchy pop gems (though "The Night You Saved My Life" is a hard one to resist). Her decision not to rock doesn't mark this album down: Beautysleep's weakness is that so many songs are pretty instead of awe-inspiring-- that she gives us only a little greatness. That naked, breathless intimacy on "The Storm"-- as she reaches for the words "can it be..."-- is unbelievably gorgeous. In those moments, it's clear that she has elevated herself to a new stage of her career. If only this album could consist only of those moments.
