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| What other people say about 'Bare' Popmatters.com: The Diva's Bare All Muic Guide Review Billboard Review Rolling Stone Germany Review Washington Post: Annie Lennox Strips Emotions In Brutal 'Bare' OC Review DPA: Annie Lennox singt sich auf Bare den Schmerz von der Seele Bernd Bothin über Bare AP Associated Press Review The Guaridan Review The Denver Post: 1 of 3 reasons to go a record store this week Rolling Stone US Review Chartattack Review USA Today Review Q: Icy Eurythmics diva back on her own again Sydney Magazine: Album of the month Billboard album preview BMG album preview MLK präsentiert Annie Lennox on tour The Diva's Bare We all age, we all suffer -- and as Annie Lennox sings, "People in glass houses shouldn't throw those stones, but something just flew through my window pane." Lennox's voice anguishes, argues, confides, seduces, and stomps, as it explores the ups and downs of love. Annie Lennox's Bare is a musical exploration of desire, love, pain, and rage. Lennox, in her solo work (Diva, Medusa) and especially in her work with Dave Stewart as part of Eurythmics, as well as in her tendency to wear black leather, sequins, feathers, plaid, male drag, ball gowns, and Mickey Mouse ears, has long embodied complexity: intelligence and sensitivity, rock and soul music, the technological and the passionate, the cynical and the tender, masculinity and femininity, the blaring and the subtle, the traditional and the new. From Josephine Baker to Little Richard to Diana Ross to Prince, from Elvis Presley to David Bowie to Madonna Louise Ciccone, performers have imagined what is yet to be, a glamour, a sensuality, a complexity, and have become it, and though sometimes dismissed as artificial or theatrical, they've then embodied real world possibility for people limited by ordinary circumstances. Singer-songwriters such as Joni Mitchell have mined their own lives for an art at once personal and social, intellectual and intimate. (Is anyone really like Joni Mitchell?) Emotions and truths that are hard to express are what Lennox expresses, and she does this with an alluring sense of drama, glamorously; and yet one wonders if giving in to emotion may not be what leads to the destruction she must then explicate and extricate herself from. Bare begins with "A Thousand Beautiful Things", an affirmation of all there is to live for, and ends with "Oh God", a confession of personal devastation and a cry for deliverance, and in between is everything else: the hopes and bitterness of love. In "A Thousand Beautiful Things" it is easy, through the clarity of Lennox's Scottish enunciation and the poetic inclination of her lyrics, to hear an echo of British poetry, though the lyrics touch on the cliché (in the attempt to see a glass as "half-full" rather than half-empty, and in listing gratitude for the "air to breathe" and the "heart to beat"). The song is obviously a gesture in the direction of balance, of mental health. (All songs were written by Lennox, and the album was produced by Stephen Lipson and engineered by Heff Moraes, except for "Beautiful Things", which was produced by Lennox, Lipson, and Andy Wright, and has a somewhat elaborate orchestration.) "Pavement Cracks", which immediately follows "Beautiful Things", opens with a street scene, somber and mundane, and in it private disappointment intrudes on but is not reflected in public space ("love don't show up in the pavement cracks"). The singer asks, "How come every day I'm still waiting for the change? How come I still say give me the strength to live?" Mournful sounds near the end of that song have a Middle Eastern tone. However, for me, the real beginning of the album is "The Hurting Time", the third song and a beautiful ballad, in which Lennox's voice is strong and the music is both spare and dramatic. It begins with lines that simultaneously evoke inevitability, the Bible, and death, such as: "Every livin' thing will surely come to pass", and the song also includes these lines: "A million little deaths you've died, the times that you've been crucified, the more you've loved and lost and tried, and still could not be satisfied. When will you be satisfied?" The predictability of suffering, and even of death in life, is what Annie Lennox makes plain in "The Hurting Time", which ends with a jazzy coda with Lennox wordlessly crooning. A contemplation of the battles fought in a relationship and its end, "Honestly", has Lennox describing her failing strategy ("Don't you know I tried and tried again to make you listen to me? But, everything I said, it always seemed to go right through you"), before admitting, "I turned myself into a person that I didn't like, but please believe me when I say I know it wasn't right". And she remains haunted: "You know I never thought I'd ever live a day without you, and that's why it makes me sad to think about you". This is a classic scenario, which of course does not make it any more bearable. In "Wonderful", about an infatuation, she condemns herself, "Idiot me, stupid me, how could I be so uncool? To fall in love with someone who doesn't really care for you. It's so obscure. But I feel wonderful", followed by a loud, soulful country rock chorus that affirms "all the heat of my desire, smokin' like some crazy fire". Where does this infatuation lead? Lennox has never been afraid to express her own rage, to express it and to mock it, and in "Bitter Pill", after warning "Don't you ever call me. I don't wanna see your face", some of her line readings seem self-mocking. The song "Loneliness", with loneliness defined as "the distance between us and the space inside ourselves", and "hopelessness is the darkness in your heart, it's the sound of one hand clapping", is one of the strongest songs on the album, with its guitars and drums, with its mix of tempos, and it ends especially well: "When I call your name, I'm gonna scream out loud. I'll say, 'Here I am standing in the crowd.' You'll say, 'Come to me with your open mind, you never know what you still might find.' But you keep me here like a cancelled flight, an empty train running through the night, an orphan child, a broken shoe, and I'm still down here looking out for you. Are you there for me? 'cause I'm here for you". Reminiscent of "Why" and "Love Song for a Vampire", "The Saddest Song I've Got" is merely a shadow of some of her best songs, though her singing "And I want you . . . not / I need you . . . not" indicate a self-contradiction, self-awareness, and wit that give the song interest. Lennox rages through "Erased", a vow to forget a relationship with the knowledge that life goes on, but the intensity one hears and the insistence on forgetting convey how important the relationship has been. Who has not felt torn, both drawn and repelled, in this way? Lennox sings, "People in glass houses shouldn't throw those stones, but something just flew through my window pane". And then, she sings "I remember, I remember everything you said to me" in "Twisted", turning "I remember, I remember" into a crazed chant. "Oh God", a quiet ballad with a childlike simplicity, is beseeching, sad, and Lennox's voice is high and almost off-key; and though the song is a prayer Lennox admits to looking down into the abyss where no god exists; and this song, which is very disturbing, might be the perfect end. When I first heard Bare, I wasn't sure that I liked it: the songwriting seemed uneven, and a few of the rhythms seem borrowed (one song brought to mind a recent Mary J. Blige hit), and something about the album reminded me of a Michael Jackson album: passionate and polished, a mix of calculation and instinct. Listening to the album over and over, I was impressed with Annie Lennox's singing and thought of the recording as a singer's album, as Lennox's voice argues, confides, distances, explains, laments, nags, seduces, and stomps. I tried to decide, Why does it matter? In a world of poverty and war, do these songs matter? Does art matter? The Epic of Gilgamesh. Aristophanes's Lysistrata. The Arabian Nights. DaVinci's Mona Lisa. Michelangelo's David. Shakespeare's comedies and tragedies. Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Henry James's The Golden Bowl. Jazz. Stravinsky and Nijinsky's Le Sacre du Printemps. Fernando Pessoa's The Book of Disquiet. Picasso's Guernica. T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets. Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man. Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun. James Baldwin's Another Country. Alvin Ailey's Revelations. The Beatles' White Album Aretha Franklin's Young, Gifted and Black. Bertolucci's Last Tango in Paris. Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon. Tony Kushner's Angels in America. Terence Malick's The Thin Red Line. Patrice Chereau's Those Who Love Me Can Take the Train. Lasting forms of art, but has art changed the world, or has art merely changed perceptions and thoughts? In changing an individual life, does art change the world? In modifying the trajectory of art forms -- and art industries, then -- does art change the world? Is it only art commerce that changes the world, or is it also art content? In the last two decades, the repetitive beats, rented and stolen melodies, and ghetto slang of hip-hop, and the angst and anger of do-it-yourself rock (punk-influenced rock), have been identified as the cutting edge of American contemporary music, but both quickly became mainstream, while the public is largely ignorant of or ignores developments and experiments in European classical music, African American improvisational music (jazz), Broadway, and various forms of contemporary music; and, though music from other continents and countries, such as Africa, India, and South America, are better known now they still have trouble reaching beyond American cities. Yet, many people talk as if hip-hop and rock are still "cool, contemporary, what's happening", and as if being perceived as current is the only standard. The dominance of hip-hop has meant a narrowing of the vocabulary used to describe not only male and female relationships but social values -- reducing much to sex, violence, and money, and while rock has maintained a broader emotional range, it has been often stuck in the mundane, cynical about heroism, passion, politics, and transcendence. What was once new is now old; and what was once transgression is now custom. Years ago, a Performing Arts Journal (1977) interviewer asked writer Susan Sontag about transgression in art, and she answered: "Transgression presupposes successful notions of order. But transgressions have been so successful that the idea of transgression has become normative for the arts -- which is a self-contradiction. Modern art wished to be -- maybe even was, for a brief time -- in an intractable, adversary relation to the established high culture. Now it is identical with high culture, supported by a vast bureaucracy of museums, universities, and state and private foundations. And the reason for this success story is that there is a close fit between many of the values promoted by modernism and the larger values of our capitalist consumer society . . ." (Conversations with Susan Sontag, University Press of Mississippi, 1995, p.86) Similarly, the pop music industry is entirely behind the formerly transgressive forms of hip-hop and rock. I listen to the radio and sample records in stores and periodically get recommendations from friends, and what is most striking about much contemporary popular music is how bad it is. It is as if both sounds and standards have been diminished. I find myself thinking again and again that we would benefit from hearing a wider range of music, different genres, by people of different ages. Of course, my generational and personal attachment to performers such as Annie Lennox, Sinead O'Connor, Cassandra Wilson, Sade, Caetana Veloso, Angelique Kidjo, Terence Trent D'Arby, Anita Baker, Miki Howard, Tracy Chapman, Ben Harper, Jeff Buckley, Cheb Khaled, Marc Anthony, Abdullah Ibrahim, Shirley Horn, Al Green, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Howlin' Wolf, Nina Simone, Kitchens of Distinction, the Devlins, Kurt Cobain and Nirvana, Hole, P.J. Harvey, David Murray, Yo Yo Ma, Kathleen Battle, Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy, Sister Souljah, Ice-T, Meshell N'degeocello, and others means that I can make easy comparisons between what is being sold as new and what I know to be good: thoughtful, responsive, charming, imaginative, persuasive, well-crafted and well-produced. It also means that I may be prejudiced. And regarding relevance? In the last few years I have had reason to be concerned about fundamental survival issues, something Annie Lennox hasn't worried about for herself in years; and yet the feelings she expresses -- of both hope and bitterness -- are closer to what I feel than the hip-hop or rock that is most celebrated. (A bio of Annie Lennox mentions that when she and Dave Stewart were "starving" she made a meal out of a little rice, potatoes, and a piece of broccoli. Is that Annie Lennox more real than today's? Was that Annie Lennox less musically astute than today's?) Bare is partly inspired by the failure of Annie Lennox's marriage of more than a decade, and Lennox's music, which is not afraid of ambition or intimacy, and not afraid of abstraction, captures impulses: feeling, wanting, needing; and it's true that even when you cannot have what you want, especially then, it is important to find articulation for what you want, though much of the world prefers to define us by the things we possess. Our wanting defines the range of our spirits. Commenting on the Bare album and its cover, an upper-body shot in which she wears nothing but a pale clay dust, false eyelashes, and what looks like a dog collar, Annie Lennox has written in her album notes, "In a sense I have 'exposed' myself through the work to reveal aspects of an inner world which are fragile . . . Broken through experience, but not entirely smashed, I am not a young artist in their early twenties. I am a mature woman facing up to the failed expectations of life and facing up to 'core' issues." The question of age is not inconsequential. Corporate companies treat artists like products with sell-by dates of about 45 years of age. Critics afraid of politics, afraid of not seeming current, afraid of getting their hands slapped, pretend as if incompetence, incoherence, and irrelevance suddenly descend on artists at middle age. (Before the release of Madonna's American Life album, The New York Times published an article asking, Is she still relevant? In a television interview that followed, Madonna asked, Is Frank Sinatra relevant? Is Aretha Franklin? Is any artist?) Critics say, "Oh, her/his work was so much better when she/he was younger." Distinctive singers are sometimes expected to imitate novices -- I recall reading a few reviews of two smart, beautifully produced records, Streisand's A Love Like Ours (1999) and Sade's Lovers Rock (2000), that basically asked, Why does this woman still sound like herself?, a question that conveys both a misunderstanding of consistent vision and integrity and a critic's inability to think about what he's hearing. Annie Lennox's early work was good, but her last two albums with Eurthymics, Savage (1987) and We Too Are One (1989), reputedly the least popular of their recordings, were also among the most mature, most diverse, and the best, just as Lennox's solo albums have been uniquely honest, strong, and emotionally vivid. Annie Lennox is not the only artist of whom this attractive maturity is true. What's wrong with our society? Conformity and stupidity. Yes -- classism, sexism, racism, and homophobia are also (also!) problems, but within the social categories we give positive and negative attention to there is also conformity and stupidity (which means, for instance, that working class people resent the ambition of their own children, that many women reject feminism in the name of personal consumerism and institutional rewards, that African Americans have trouble supporting the creativity -- not just the success -- of African American artists and intellectuals, and that gay men often reject homosexual men who have the critical or moral sense to object to the drug and alcohol abuse and promiscuity in the gay milieu. I could also note the virtues of each of these groups, such as the practicality of the working class, or the loyalty gay men give to artists, but I'm not preparing a balance sheet but rather am noting limitations to progressive cultural development). What we require as individuals and what artists deserve is freedom, and to be evaluated and rewarded based on merit, even if we do not fit narrow molds with their meretricious contemporary disguises. Annie Lennox's Eurythmics legacy includes the songs "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)", "Here Comes the Rain Again", "Regrets" (which begins "I've got a delicate mind, I've got a dangerous nature, and my fist collides with your furniture"), and "Who's That Girl" (a personal favorite), "Missionary Man", "When Tomorrow Comes", and the surprisingly sweet "The Miracle of Love", as well as the albums Savage and We Too Are One, all from the 1980s, and also the late 1990s reunion album Peace. Savage has a cosmopolitan sensibility -- topical, sexy, serious and ironic, moving from one emotional or social scene to another with energy and insight. "Take a girl like that, and put her in a natural setting -- like a café for example", begins the first song, "Beethoven (I Love to Listen To)". That song's title alone, like the one that follows, "I've Got A Lover (Back in Japan)", are not the references one expects in music marketed to western youths, who like novelty and sensation usually as long as they are simple. In Savage's "You've Placed A Chill in My Heart", Lennox sings, "Love is a temple, love is a shrine, love is pure, and love is blind, love is a religious sign, I'm gonna leave this love behind". I read that as a rejection of the ideology of love in the face of real world dissatisfaction. "Wide Eyed Girl", about an exuberant young woman, is set in Rome. Hearing the drama of excess in "I Need You" first led me to think it was a brilliant, bitter joke: "I need you to really feel the twist of my back breaking, I need someone to listen to the ecstasy I'm faking" are two of its milder lines. The album concludes with the disappointment and resolution of "Brand New Day". We Too Are One's songs are about bonds shared by the miserable, and politics, romantic revenge, loneliness, and compassion, and closes with the song "When the Day Goes Down", which says, "All the people of this lonely world have got a piece of pain inside. Don't go thinking you're the only one whoever broke right down and cried". Lennox's Diva (1992) album starts with the beautiful "Why", as unusual a radio single as Streisand's "My Heart Belongs to Me" almost two decades before -- an intelligent, strong woman's poignant rendering of a relationship's demise, dignified, melancholy, philosophical. The album contains, among other songs, the uptempo "Walking on Broken Glass" and "Money Can't Buy It", a song against shallow distractions that includes Lennox's "rich white girl" rap, a song now echoed by Madonna's "American Life". The closing song, "The Gift", suggests spiritual evolution and unfolds like a play. The Medusa album (1995), made up of songs written by Neil Young, Paul Simon, and Bob Marley, among others, contains the lovely, theatrical "No More 'I Love You's'", the rocking and soulful "Train in Vain", the sad "Downtown Lights", and the tender "Waiting in Vain". Peace (1999), produced after Lennox's first two solo albums with Dave Stewart as part of Eurythmics, features "Peace Is Just A Word", "My True Love", and "Lifted", and has a song, "17 Again" that reprises "Sweet Dreams", in which Lennox sings, "Sweet dreams are made of anything that gets you in the scene", a far from romantic sentiment. In "Anything But Strong", Lennox asks, "What are we really learning when we make the same mistakes?" Such thoughts do not gratify the superficial. "I want it all. I don't know what it is but I want it all … Gimme, gimme some more of the same old stuff. It don't make me happy and it's never enough", Lennox sings in "I Want It All", hunger projected to the point of hysteria and hilarity. My guess is that she uses "I" to critique many of "us". Having a large audience does not always require pandering, sinking to the lowest common concerns; sometimes it requires an artist to become broader, deeper, more imaginative. Bare is not the odd thing even Lennox might see it as: she has long made music that reveals complexity and love and torment, and the lives in which they are situated. Does it matter? Does art matter? Everyone is alone, and the world comes to each of us in the form of family, friendship, and love; and so, when we speak of love, we speak not only of sex but of our most personal relationship to the world -- and that is why love takes such a large place in our imaginations, why it becomes symbolic. (Adrienne Rich has written, "An honorable relationship -- that is, one in which two people have the right to use the word 'love' -- is a process, delicate, violent, and often terrifying to both persons involved, a process of refining the truths they can tell each other" in "Women and Honor," On Lies, Secrets, and Silence, W.W. Norton, 1979, p. 188.) To look at our lives, and to look at art, history, and politics, and to say that nothing has changed is to deny the sacrifice and suffering of yesterday, and of those who have come before us, whereas to say that not enough has changed is to take note of the work we have yet to do. We misunderstand that work when we misunderstand ourselves. We often tend to err on remembering mostly the good or mostly the bad and by defining reality by what we remember, by what we're aware of, but art comes as close as we can to remembering it all. That is the service it provides. Art gives us pleasure, reflects our pain, and it is an important part of our collective human memory. With Bare, Annie Lennox has added another chapter to an honest and valuable body of work. (Daniel Garrett, popmatters.com) All Muic Guide Review It's been eight years since Medusa, Annie Lennox's last studio album was released. It's been 11 since her debut solo effort and five since the short-lived Eurhythmics reunion. And while she may not be prolific, Lennox is always enigmatic. Bare is a collection of self-penned tracks that the artist explains in the liners that "This album contains songs that are deeply personal and emotional. In a sense I have 'exposed' myself through the work to reveal aspects of an inner world that are fragile…broken through experience but not entirely smashed. I am not a young artist in their (sic) twenties. I am a mature woman facing up to the failed expectations of life and facing up to 'core' issues." Sound pretentious? One listen proves that Lennox lives up to her claims in spades. Here are 11 wholly-even infectiously—accessible, lyrically savvy, and gorgeously wrought pop songs full of spiritual and emotional depth that make for a deeply moving whole. On Bare, soul, adult contemporary, subtle yet unmistakable pop hooks and an elegant use of electronic soundscapes converge in song styles to create not a tapestry but a work of such interwoven depth its only visual counterpart would be a fine Persian carpet. On "Wonderful" the refrain brings a Hall & Oates-styled Philly soul refrain to one of Lennox's trademark ballads constructed from repetitive finger picked electric guitar lines, a simple rhythm machine loop, and gentle synth washes in the background. But it's in the lyrical paradox where the grain of her voice goes straight for a truth and need that the listener almost feels she's peeled off one layer too many-not hers, ours: "I wanna hold you/And be so held back/Don't wanna need you/But it's where I'm at/Thinkin' about you every day/How come I was made that way…God it makes me so blue/Every time I think about you/All of the heat of my desire/Smokin' like some crazy fire/Come on here/Loot at me/ Where I stand/Can't you see my heart burning in my hands?/Do you want me? Do you not?…" The previous track, is a guitar kissed ballad with limpid choruses that sear with the truth of having believed-perhaps willingly-that each lie a lover ever told. Is and is destined to be played in every post midnight, broken-hearted, half -empty bedroom for decades to come. And though the previous examples come from near the middle of the album, they don't begin to tell the whole story as each track fits hand in glove with another. It not only can be taken as a whole, it must be, for it rains down on the heart of the listener with such a fierce life force despite the depleted spirit exhibited in many of the cuts. There are no more words for the ravaged, triumphant Bare, the truth of its fineness and devastating beauty is in the hearing. (Thom Jurek, AllMusicGuide) Billboard Review Bare is Annie Lennox's first set of solo, self-penned material since her 1992 debut album, Diva. (Medusa, issued in 1995, was a collection of covers.) It showcases a woman who is collecting her thoughts following a loss. (Lennox and documentary filmmaker Uri Fruchtmann recently divorced.) Universal themes of adoration, loneliness, depression, hope, and healing abound. The bittersweet, electro-charged lead single, "Pavement Cracks," is about seeing the light at the end of a darkened tunnel. Conversely, "The Hurting Time" finds the artist at one of life's lowest points. By the album's closer, "Oh God," Lennox is awaiting tomorrow's sun—knowing it will come. Mature and very elegant, Bare is one of the year's best albums. (MP, Billboard Magazine) Rolling Stone Germany Review Wenn Ayurveda, Kabbala und der Maharishi nicht mehr helfen, dann macht sie sich halt nackig. Sieht ja noch ganz resch [sic] aus für bald 50, wenn auch nicht auf dem Cover, wo sie wie ein in Babypuder gewälztes Huhn ausschaut, mit markanter Falte um den Mund. Annie Lennox ist ein so genanntes Thema für Frauenzeitschrifen und den "stern". Nachdem Madonnas militante Selbstbespiegelung gescheitert ist, kommt hier die reife Frau mit Lebenserfahrung und Narben auf der Seele, ungebeugt auf der Suche nach ihrer Mitte. Sie kommt in Keyboard-Ambiente mit viel Hall, synthetischem Schlagwerk und gehobenen Sehnsuchts-, Trauer- und Befindlichkeitsschlagern. Die sind sehr beliebig und sehr geschwätzig, aber hey, Annie hat sie alle selbst geschrieben. Es geht also um "Loneliness", "Bitter Pill", "A Thousand Beautiful Things" und "The Hurting Time". Als ob die Menopause singen könnte! Manchmal aber klingt Annie's Stimme noch immer nach Soul statt nach Botox. Am Schluss betet sie: "Oh God / If there was ever a soul to save / It must be me." Aber wo ist eigentlich dieser langhaarige, bartstoppelige Lemure, die Annie früher begleitete? 2 of 5 stars (Arne Willander, Rolling Stone Germany) Washington Post: Annie Lennox Strips Emotions In Brutal 'Bare' A breakup album that will bum out even the happiest of young lovers, Annie Lennox's painfully pretty "Bare" -- her first set of original material in 11 years -- offers several instant warnings that this will not be a Eurythmic-y ride. Song titles include "The Hurting Time," "Bitter Pill" and "The Saddest Song I've Got," and a liner note from the Scottish musician claims, "I am a mature woman facing up to the failed expectations of life." But even with those blue clues, the 11 tracks here -- all written in the shadows of her failed 12-year marriage to filmmaker Uri Fruchtman -- still pack a surprising wallop. "Everything I wanna be / Comes crashing down on me," Lennox sings on the first single, "Pavement Cracks," one of the few tunes that match her downtrodden sentiment with a radio-friendly beat and catchy chorus. The up-tempo "Bitter Pill" ("Don't you ever call me / I don't wanna see your face") meshes head-bob hip-hop drumming with vitriolic lyrics that induce shock rather than singalongs. For the most part, Lennox's for-the-ages white-soul wail is framed by minimal synth-washed soundscapes. With its sweet, plaintive melody, "The Saddest Song I've Got" is the album's dirgelike centerpiece, a lush plea for reprieve from the pain. "Erased" imagines the awkwardness of meeting her ex in the future and features a startling burst of guitar from producer Stephen Lipson. And whatever uplift is provided by the penultimate cut, "Twisted," is washed away by album closer "Oh God (Prayer)," on which Lennox, accompanied by a slow, pulsing piano line, chokes back tears and begs for a "helping hand." "Bare" is certainly a beautiful album, but it's also as brutal as they come. (Sean Daly, The Washington Post) OC Review Eleven years after breaking away from Eurythmics with "Diva," the androgynous one returns with a pretty great divorce album, though you'd be hard-pressed to tell its nature if you didn't know the back story; her entire catalog is tainted by heartbreak, and "Why" is still a better example of her titanic sorrow. Though nothing here equals that personal triumph or the beleaguered brilliance of "Cold," there are more than a few that come close - chilly- soul standouts, like choice Sade, that aren't quite as memorable but remind what a magnificent vocalist and underrated (if less-than-prodigious) writer the recluse is. Better still is when she gives her anguish a chin-up-baby beat - the slow-to-swell surge of the tear-stained "Wonderful," for instance. Anyone who can make the line "God, it makes me feel so blue every time I think of you" sound like a celebration knows something you don't about matters of the heart. Grade: B+ (Ben Wener, OCRegister.com) DPA: Annie Lennox singt sich auf Bare den Schmerz von der Seele Harte Schale, weicher Kern: Noch kantiger als sonst blickt die Eurythmics-Sängerin Annie Lennox vom Cover ihres dritten Soloalbums «Bare». Die elf Songs sind aber sanftmütige Lieder über Schmerz, Verlust, Versagen - und Hoffnung. Die heute 48-Jährige hatte mit den Aufnahmen kurz nach dem Scheitern ihrer Ehe mit dem israelischen Filmemacher Uri Fruchtmann vor drei Jahren begonnen. Der Titel «Bare» (Nackt) treffe voll zu, sagt sie. «Die Songs kommen aus der Tiefe meiner Seele.» Und ihre durchdringende Stimme scheint noch stärker und klarer als zuvor. Der Einblick in ihre innere Welt mache sie zwar verwundbar, aber sie hoffe, dass die Zuhörer eine Beziehung zu den Liedern aufbauen und sie ein Teil von ihnen werden, erklärt Lennox. «Ich vermute, dass eine ganze Generation sich damit identifizieren könnte.» Vielleicht gehöre das Album daher eher ins Selbsthilfe-Regal eines Buchgeschäfts als in einen CD-Laden. Es ist das zweite Album, auf dem Lennox ihre eigenen Lieder singt - und das vorherige liegt ganze elf Jahre zurück. «Diva» prägte sich mit Hits wie «Why?» und «Walking On Broken Glass» ein und wurde weltweit sieben Millionen Mal gekauft. Zwei Jahre später folgte «Medusa», eine Kollektion von Cover-Versionen, und dann konzentrierte sie sich darauf, Mutter und Ehefrau zu sein, mit Ausnahme des Eurythmics-Albums «Peace» 1999. «"Bare" ist ein sehr reifes Album», sagt Lennox selbst. Es ist musikalisch noch sanfter und ruhiger als seine beiden Vorgänger. Die Zeit der wilden Bühnenauftritte der Eurythmics-Annie aus den 80ern ist vorbei. «Ich bin 48, ich werde bald 50 sein, und das ist in Ordnung so, ich komme mit meinem Alter klar.» Geblieben von damals ist ihr Markenzeichen, die blonde Kurzhaar-Frisur, die ihr vor 20 Jahren Ärger und Aufsehen einhandelte: Der US-Musiksender MTV wollte vor der Ausstrahlung des Videos zu «Love Is A Stranger» ihren Pass sehen, um sich zu überzeugen, dass sie wirklich eine Frau ist. Der umstrittene Clip gewann schließlich einen Preis für das Video des Jahres und markierte den Anfang des Eurythmics-Aufstiegs. Die Eurythmics-Jahre und -Songs waren auch von Beziehungsschmerz geprägt. Lennox und Bandpartner Dave Stewart waren über Jahre ein Liebespaar - allerdings noch vor der Eurythmics-Zeit. Es war Lennox, die die Beziehung beendete. «Ich liebe ihn, aber ich kann es mit ihm nicht aushalten», bekannte sie später. Das Verhältnis sei zu eng, zu intensiv, zu aufreibend gewesen. Die spätere musikalische Zusammenarbeit war für Lennox über Jahre auch qualvoll, weil sie Zeugin Stewarts unzähliger Liebschaften wurde, aber sie konnte es sich nicht vorstellen, mit jemand anderem Songs zu schreiben. «Ich singe über Schmerz, und große Songs sind immer voller Schmerz. Und gleichzeitig voller Freude», sagt Lennox. Darum gehe es auch in der Single-Auskoppelung «Pavement Cracks» (Risse im Bürgersteig). «In meinen schlimmsten Zeiten ließ ich wortwörtlich meinen Kopf hängen und hatte nur die Risse im Bürgersteig vor Augen, wenn ich durch die Straßen ging. Irgendwann bemerkte ich aber das Grün, dass durch die Risse sprießt, wie ein Symbol für Hoffnung.» (dpa) Bernd Bothin über Bare Annie Lennox zaubert wieder ihre wunderbaren Meisterstücke ... wieder ist es ein grosser Genuss, ihr zuzuhören und sich berauschen zu lassen von dieser wunderbaren Stimme,die alle Stimmungen und Empfindungen auslösen kann,die so klar ins Herz zielt,dass es fast wehtut und dann wieder mitreisst wie bei einem Neuanfang. Perfekt, grandios ... zauberhaft. (Bernd Bothin, Fan, AnnieLennox.de) AP Associated Press Review The third solo release from the former Eurythmics front-woman should satisfy her longtime fans. But "Bare" really isn't potent enough to draw in new listeners. It's beautifully produced — almost too beautifully. While the full orchestra gives many tracks an atmospheric, lush sound, it sounds a bit too clean, too controlled. Lennox has a powerful voice and it would be thrilling to hear her truly let it loose. "A Thousand Beautiful Things," "Wonderful" and "Pavement Cracks," the release's first single, are worth a listen. But, overall, "Bare" isn't much more than dinner party background music. (Kim Curtis, Associated Press) The Guardian Review Annie Lennox is a mature woman facing up to life's failed expectations and core issues. Not my words - hers. The back cover of her first solo record since the 1995 covers album, Medusa, is devoted to a rambling explanation of her state of mind, which can be summed up as down but not entirely out. A bleak sense of acceptance, apparently triggered by the end of a relationship, is conveyed in both the songs and the spooky cover photo, which portrays her as a bleached-out ghost. Lennox's lyrics are of such unrelenting bitterness ("Don't you dare call me, don't darken this place/ What do you expect from me? Emptiness and misery") that, taken as a whole, Bare leaves a heart-shaped stain. Cunningly, she sweetens the pill with stomping choruses that prove there's a bit of Eurythmic in the old girl yet. Slower numbers such as country pastiche The Hurting Kind sag with glorious yearning. Lennox's full-bodied mid-life voice and the silken production will find Bare a home on every well-bred coffee table. A worthy addition to the canon of fortysomething breakup albums. 3 of 5 stars (Caroline Sullivan, The Guardian) The Denver Post: 1 of 3 reasons to go to a record store this week Annie Lennox wrote and recorded "Bare" (J), her first album of self-penned songs since her multi-platinum solo debut "Diva" in 1992, in the aftermath of her marriage to filmmaker Uri Fruchtman. The sad songs about intimate betrayal - highlights are the pensive "A Thousand Beautiful Things" and the R&B-flavored "Wonderful" - are rooted in steely rock, muted electronica and understated strings, effective stages for her husky voice. (G. Brown, The Denver Post) Rolling Stone US Review On Bare, her first album of new songs in eight years, Annie Lennox offers few surprises -- and that's fine. She has claimed a brand of stylish, postmodern soul singing -- pained but detached; theatrical yet spare -- as uniquely her own, and she presents it here with all the confidence her experience has earned. As always with her, the ballads (e.g., "A Thousand Beautiful Things") work best; searching for hope amid heartbreak is the essence of her art. And when she gives her desire for deliverance a metaphysical spin on "Oh God," she's both moving and convincing. There are missteps: The thumping funk chorus of "Wonderful," for example, sounds forced. But Lennox knows her strengths and her limits -- and, most important, how to satisfy her audience without pandering. 3 of 5 stars (Anthony Decurtis, Rolling Stone, USA) Chartattack Review Bare is Annie Lennox's first album of original material in over a decade, and it is a decidedly maudlin affair. Not that melancholy is anything new for Lennox; the theme has pervaded her work since her days with the Eurythmics. What is different is Stephen Lipson's sparse production, which casts a thin, velvety fabric under Lennox's plaintive vocals. This unfortunately also places undue emphasis on Lennox's cliche-o-matic lyrics. She's hurtin' and longin' for some lovin', holdin' and hangin' on, hopin' that she'll quit feelin' low, 'cause a bitter pill is slidin' down her throat. This reviewer can't remember the last time he saw so many apostrophes on a lyric sheet. If you need a Lennox fix, stick with 1992’s Diva. (Darrin Keene, Chartattack.com) USA Today Review Leave it to Lennox to take a sad song and make it better. Her first solo outing since 1995's Medusa cover collection is a breakup album, but Lennox bares her grief with more grace and vivacity than many artists apply to inspirational music. On elegantly soulful gems such as The Hurting Time, Honestly and Twisted, pain isn't a pool to wallow in, but rather a source of self-discovery and hard-earned growth. The shivery warmth of her voice is perfectly suited to Steven Lipson's production, which, like Lennox's writing, finds sparks even in cool, dark places. Any diva worth her salt can sell a good sob story, but few can achieve the kind of transcendence that makes this songbird soar. 3.5 of 4 stars (Gardner, USA Today) Q: Icy Eurythmics diva back on her own again 1999's Peace reunion with Dave Stewart having failed to lure back the faithful in sufficient numbers, Lennox returns to the fray with this third solo collection. As may be gleaned from the titles (Erased, Loneliness, Twisted, The Saddest Song), its no laughing matter. Producer Stephen Lipson gives everything an 80's sheen and there's an authoritative strut to Bitter Pill and Pavement Cracks. But whatevever her technical gifts as vocalist,there remains something chilly and self-satisfied about the womans brand of soul-baring that makes it awfully hard to swallow. Still, at least there's no rapping. ** (2 out of 5) (Peter Kane, Q magazine, July 2003) Sydney Magazine: Album of the month What do you mean, you 'hated' the Eurythmics?, OK, Dave Stewart was a weirdie-beirdie, but Annie Lennox was a goddess: a spiky diva with the voice of an angel. A soul sister who could do it by herself. Now, eight years after Lennox's last solo effort (the wonderful 1995 album of cover songs, Medusa) the classically trained Scottish siren is back. Bare isn't exactly a barrel of laughs; it's a deep confessional album of electronic soul that offers some stark insights into the many moods of the 48-year-old mother of two. The Saddest Song, Loneliness and The Hurting Time set the tone and prove that misery really is the artist's best friend. "How am I gonna find happiness and peace of mind when I'm losing all the time," she wails on Bitter Pill. Search me, Annie, but it sure is purdy listening to you try. And hey, if we have to have an '80s revival, just be grateful we're getting new solo material from Annie Lennox, not Andrew Ridgley. (Sydney magazine, Sydney Morning Herald) Billboard album preview The songs are gorgeously lush, elegant, and eloquent, and for someone who readily admits to having taken herself out of the current music scene to be a mom, it is startlingly contemporary. ... Lennox's writing craft remains sharp and poignant and her voice as emotive and crystalline as ever. (Billboard) BMG album preview More than three years after the Eurythmics’ last album "Peace," and nearly eight years after her second solo album "Medusa," BMG is releasing Annie Lennox’ new album, "Bare," in June. The CD streets worldwide on Jun 9, except in the U.S., where it will be in stores Jun 10. After "Diva" and "Medusa," "Bare" is the artist’s third solo release – and arguably one of the year’s most eagerly anticipated releases. Annie Lennox is a multi-platinum, Grammy and Brit Award winning artist who received the prestigious Billboard Century Award last December. "Bare" was recorded in London, and, like "Diva" and "Medusa," was produced by Steve Lipson. For BMG, the songs on "Bare" are just one more proof of Annie’s unique ability to communicate her emotions, seemingly one-on-one, to each and every listener. Producer Steve Lipson has already described "Bare" as a "truly career defining album. Her best yet...". (BMG) MLK präsentiert Annie Lennox on tour Parallel zu ihrer Tournee präsentiert Annie Lennox ihr drittes, langerwartetes Solo-Album Bare. Unter Anleitung ihres Lieblingsproduzenten Steve Lipson entstanden zeitlos schöne Popsongs, die von Annies markanter Stimme und einer dichten Instrumentierung, von Gefühlen und Leidenschaft leben. In Titeln wie Oh God oder The Saddest Song I've Got lässt sich Annie ganz fallen und offenbart dabei ihre Gefühlswelt. „Ich bin kein starker Mensch, aber ich habe keine Angst vor Gefühlen, selbst wenn sie düster sind. Denn ich weiß, ich bin damit nicht allein.” So wird Offenheit und Nacktheit schon im CD-Titel thematisiert. Annie Lennox verzichtet bewusst darauf, zeitgemäß und modisch zu klingen. "Man muss eben authentisch sein und ich bin, wer ich bin!" (MLK) © La Lennoxa, BMG, Ino Hillert, 2003 This homepage is part of www.ethrill.net - The Eurythmics Fanweb! This page is not authorized, but partially supported by BMG and Eurythmics. |
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