Scarlett Johansson, the musician, has a way of getting herself into impossible situations. Like, I dunno, making her official recording debut with a version of jazz standard "Summertime". Joining a reunited Jesus and Mary Chain onstage at Coachella. Taking on the Tom Waits songbook. Covering Jeff Buckley's "Last Goodbye" for a romantic comedy based on a self-help book. Or owning the lips that inspired Katy Perry's "I Kissed a Girl". Um, I guess that last one isn't really Johansson's fault.
Add to the list: Putting out an album inspired by the 1960s duets of Serge Gainsbourg and Brigitte Bardot. Especially when the unkempt male in question is Pete Yorn, who had an unfairly panned sleeper of a debut album back in the David Gray era, then followed it with the kind of blandly forgettable slump that made a lot of people wonder why they ever liked either of those guys in the first place. On last year's Anywhere I Lay My Head, Waits' songs and producer David Sitek's woozy 4AD-style majesty would've made for an intriguing listen even if Johansson had been awful (she totes wasn't). Break Up, by contrast, resembles a Yorn album: nine tracks of tastefully beige, electronics-brushed roots-rock. Suddenly, Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward's collaboration as She & Him sounds like The Velvet Underground & Nico.
In a way, it's a shame Yorn ever started making comparisons to classic "guy-girl" duos at all. If you take Break Up for what it is-- a low-key project recorded with little preparation in a couple of afternoons three years ago-- then the set has its charms. First single "Relator", for one, with its buzzing instrumental hook and breezy acoustic shuffle, is engagingly playful Rushmore fodder, only a White Stripes credit away from a spot on way too many year-end lists. When Yorn goes uptempo again, with the weeping guitar fills and crisp drum machines of "Blackie's Dead", he comes up with more of the blankly catchy hooks that propelled him to stardom. The song even ends with a mildly satisfying twist: "Darlin', you're forgiven/ I don't like what's goin' on."
That's right: In case you couldn't tell from the name, Break Up is about two characters who gradually find themselves in an impossible situation of their own. This conceit means just that much more extra-musical baggage for the skeptics out there to overlook. But as you might expect, it happens to suit Johansson. When she's able to sing closer to her natural, deeper range, as on a vaguely futuristic cover of late Big Star member Chris Bell's 1978 single "I Am the Cosmos", the husky creak in her voice would demand attention even if you didn't know her from Kirsten Dunst. But the same song is also one of the main instances where Quincy Jones grandson Sunny Levine's generally background-friendly production starts to get in the way, all vwerping bass and annoying tick-tocks. On predictable country-rocker "I Don't Know What to Do", complete with honky-tonk piano, how much fun Johansson is having beams right through lyrics clouded with confusion and doubt.
It's nobody's fault that She & Him's fine Volume One came out first, but the girl-next-door quality, like the usually higher vocal register, suits the glamorous Johansson less than it would the more approachable Deschanel. And that's when Johansson isn't buried in the mix: On banjo-rock plodder "Wear and Tear", she gets in barely a few backing words, while on bossa nova-tinged "Shampoo", Levine's stereo-panned electronic sounds-- twinkling in one channel, crunching in the other-- communicate the couple's disconnect better than anything in their dull dialogue (Johansson: "Run away"; Yorn: "I'd go anywhere with you"). Even on "Relator", Johansson's voice is crammed into the same kind of telephone-style filter that Yorn used to more memorable effect on 2001 single "Life on a Chain".
Yorn's story really isn't as different from Johansson's as you might think. His first big break came through the movies, too, when "Strange Condition" (later re-recorded with R.E.M.'s Peter Buck) landed on the soundtrack to 2000 Farrelly Brothers film Me, Myself & Irene. Nor is Break Up Yorn's first collaboration with a female singer. He previously worked with the Dixie Chicks' Natalie Maines on "The Man", an otherwise pretty typical Yorn midtempo strummer from his rock-leaning 2006 album, Nightcrawler. More recently, Yorn-- like Johansson-- has turned to veterans from the world of indie rock, working with Saddle Creek producer Mike Mogis on this year's cleverly titled Back and Fourth.
Still, "Relator" aside, there's little about this duo's chemistry that lives up to Matt and Kim, let alone Lee Hazlewood and Nancy Sinatra. "The memory fades away," Yorn sings in that faded Ryan Adams whisper on Break Up's sorrowful finale, "Someday". Their album is better than the knee-jerk beauty haters will tell you, but it rarely has the tunes or emotional impact to make it one of those rare impossible situations you'll actually want to remember. Breaking up shouldn't be this hard to do.
