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| From | "Jason Damas" <jason.damas@gmail.com> |
| Subject | Re: Liz Phair's Singing - Does It Matter? |
| Date | Wed, 5 Oct 2005 18:12:34 -0400 |
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I agree wholeheartedly with Bill's assessment, and find the misogyny that
runs through the critique of Ms. Phair's recordings (persona?) here and
elsewhere to be more than a little alarming. After all, this is the stuff
that she's lampooned on record since the beginning, whether through turning
the sexism around ("Exile In Guyville") and against men, or by simply
crawling inside of it to reveal its ridiculousness (most of the 2003 album).
Furthermore, I too saw her on a 2003 tour and found the performance to be
incredibly strong: she was cool and confident, and totally OWNED the
audience with a great set of material spanning her whole career.
Furthermore, the assessment (I'm not sure who wrote it) that:
<<And people wonder why the music industry is falling apart.
Give me talent over tits anytime. Cause those puppies will eventually sag,
but the music will still be fresh as the day it was recorded.>>
Is also pretty frickin silly. By that logic, you'd rather listen to Mariah
Carey--who can sing, but who sings rather awful material--over someone like
Phair, who has been creative and diverse and produced some great material in
the past decade? Now THAT tells me exactly why the music industry is falling
apart.
Creativity and personality matter most, and that's something that Liz Phair
has in spades. --Jason
<< A bold statement, that.
C'mon now. Anybody who's paid more than a few minutes attention to any of
the records Liz has done from the Girlysounds stuff to the new one (which I
haven't heard a bit of yet) knows that Liz Phair has a limited vocal
instrument. Sometimes it's clearer than at others, depending on the
material, but Liz is in no danger of ever being invited to sing opera. On
the other hand, when her songs are as compelling (dare I say "important?")
as they are with her best material, her voice's relative flaws, rather
obvious ones, are completely irrelevant. The great bulk of the time, the
fact that Liz is, at best, a mediocre singer with a tendency to flatten,
isn't particularly important to the overall enjoyment of the tunes.
As far as the recent teevee appearance that spurred this thread goes, it
reminded me of the first time I saw her on Letterman years ago (I think she
was doing "Supernova" and WHIP SMART had just come out). She was pretty
awful, and it was entirely because of her voice. She was clearly too nervous
not to warble, and there was nowhere to hide. On the other hand, I've paid
good money to see Liz play in concert and at both shows (1998 in San
Francisco touring WHITECHOCELATESPACETHINGYWHATEVER and in 2003 touring her
much-maligned, self-titled record) she was in fine voice, more than holding
her own and fronting a crack band (in '99) and even a lesser sloppier rock
crew last time 'round. Sure, the limited range is there and will stay there,
but Liz was confident and cool-- everything you'd expect from a front-person
in terms of performance. To say that she is incapable of competent live
performance is simply wrong, I'm here to witness. Did none of us see her
"Sessions on West 54t!
h" performance with that '98 band (which had Ric Menck on drums, most
notably, plus others who I've forgotten)? Liz was just the same as I saw her
in San Fran, completely confident.
Liz is not a strong singer. This is news? She is certainly more than capable
of getting the job done both live and on record. >>
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