| "Polly Jean's Bluesy Smolder" San Francisco Examiner/Chronicle Datebook - 3/12/95 (pp. 42-3) Polly Jean Harvey truly is a groundbreaking artist. Hearing her hiss "You bend over, Casanova" on her second album, 1992's (sic) "Rid of Me", you either became a fan for life or ran screaming for the woods. On that album, Harvey managed to embody all that Rush Limbaugh fears about womanhood, and worse. She was talented, smart, funny, and raging, roiling mad. Harvey has an innate ability to mess with the status quo, whether by informing ex-lovers that they will never be rid of her, or blasting hoary Bob Dylan songs straight into the 21st century. Produced by punk-rock scion Steve Albini at his most abrasive, "Rid of Me" (and last year's "4 Track Demos") confronted and reconstructed almost every preconception about female rock singers. Even more than Harvey's debut album, "Dry", "Rid of Me" was an awe-inspiring, menacing moment in rock. This year's follow-up, the far smoother but equally brilliant "To Bring You My Love", is not going to scare the pants off Rush and Co. But it has other consolations. Harvey, a blues enthusiast, is that rare breed of artist who can transform another era's music. Last year's "Man Size" single featured a thrilling cover of Willie Dixon's "Wang Dang Doodle", and this year's "Long Snake Moan" invokes blues legend Leadbelly's "New Black Snake Moan". But on "To Bring You My Love", Harvey finally makes Delta blues her own. The title cut in particular has a bluesy feel, but Harvey reinvents the classic form so that it reflects her own wry, distressing image. Those who were enthralled by the scratchy rawness of Harvey's past three records may find "To Bring You My Love" formal and distanced in comparison. These days, Harvey is backing off from the cryptic rock Medusa bit, replacing it with more universal plaints. "C'mon Billy", for example, is sung by a single mom to a man who forsakes his own child. "I Think I'm a Mother" is a self-explanatory moan of anticipatory pain. The fitful single "Down by the Water" is about loss of innocence, suicide and original sin. In spite of its chilling, whispered chorus, it is the most accessible song the relentlessly uncommercial Harvey has ever written. In short, on the new record she seems to be trading her unbridled passion and wildly creative voice for serious singing and a more concentrated intensity. Harvey's current sensibility, if not her actual sound, owes much to Nick Cave - particularly the biblical themes and references ("I've lain with the devil/ cursed God above/ forsaken heaven/ to bring you my love"). But Harvey isn't as much of a cariacture as Cave. Her uniqueness burns through every song. The themes on "To Bring You My Love" - love, betrayal, infidelity - are more obvious than they were on her earlier work, but they are nonetheless compelling. Rhythm has always been a crucial element in Harvey's music. Despite having divested herself of her founding band members and rhythm section, Steve Vaughn and Rob Ellis, there's still a throbbing urgency to every beat of every song that gives her work unbearable tension. Although slower than "Dry" and "Rid of Me", "To Bring You My Love" still pulsates with originality and motion: It is the sound of rock and roll being wrestled to earth by an artist of enormous talent. |
