Possibly The Awesomest Terrible Singer In The World

[plumtreeblossom]

I stumbled across Joanna Newsom completely at random while reading the Wikipedia page of her boyfriend (actor Andy Samberg). At first listen I was both bewildered and riveted at the same time. I didn't want to keep listening but couldn't stop listening because there's something akin to magic about the bizarre music she makes. Honestly, her voice sounds like Bjork's irritable Siamese cat with an epic sinus infection. But juxtaposed against her gorgeous harp playing and her rich, quirky lyrics, it folds together into something that defies... pretty much everything.

There's something inspiring about an artist who can take every contemporary convention we have about what constitutes "good" singing and chuck them right out the window. Lots of composers with mediocre or poor singing voices collaborate with better voiced singers to bring their songs to life. But sometimes, someone wants to sing their own song regardless of what their voice sounds like, and if they have the right combination of confidence, stage presence and thick skin, they can do it, damn the torpedoes. Whether liked or disliked, the voice of this elven bardette certainly draws strong emotional reactions. If you click through to the comment thread on Youtube, there is passionate fighting between those who think her vocal cords should be slit and those who look up to her as a hero.

Anyway, listen if you can handle it, respect if you're inspired to.

Comments

[scholargipsy.livejournal.com]

You're more charitable than I; I found her excruciating. That's not to say she isn't brave, or that she has no right to sing -- follow your bliss and all that. But I will elect not to listen (though the harping is damn cool).

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

As a casual fan of Bjork, I tried to figure out why her outlandish voice is quite a bit more palatable than Joanna Newsom's. I think it's that Bjork is a forceful belter whose voice is usually part of a larger electronica soundscape in which some of the vocal oddities get buried. Joanna presents her voice in a stark naked form, letting every bit of ugliness proudly show.

I was horror-struck at first listen, but I listened to a few more of her songs and now I'm kind of hooked.

[kalliejenn2.livejournal.com]

i don't hate it, but i have to be honest - my first thought was that she sounds a bit like she has down syndrome.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I listened to a spoken interview of her, and what's mystifying is that her speaking voice is perfectly normal. After hearing a few songs I expected her to have a MAJOR speech impediment, but she doesn't have any at all. I don't know what it is about the singing that makes her diction go all garbled.

[minkrose]

Listening to this, I think it's deliberate. I don't think this is a singing thing that makes her voice weird, I think she makes her voice like this when she sings.

I'm not sure it's GOOD for her voice but it does sound calculated and deliberate. She certainly has good pitch.

I didn't find it hard to listen to but I did have all the build-up of what to expect. I've heard MUCH MUCH MUCH worse singing (people who can't carry a tune in a bucket) from people who are "trained." I had a friend who got a degree in singing from Emmanuel and invited me to her final concert. I had heard her sing in high school and thought perhaps she had improved, so I invited Andy to come with me (this was about three years ago so we hadn't been dating long). It was a DISASTER. Her voice wasn't strong enough, the songs were poorly sung and she had no character or charisma to her singing. And we were sitting next to her former vocal coach so I didn't feel I could whisper to Andy about it. We left promptly at the end and walked down the hallway, at which point I said "I am SO SORRY" and Andy was glad that he didn't have to navigate complimenting her.

So, you can get a degree in singing and still be unbearable. Ms. Newsom is ten times more interesting and therefore enjoyable (on some level) to listen to. She has talent, regardless of whether I like what she's doing with it.

[dabroots.livejournal.com]

It's the sort of thing that you either like, in a strange sort of way, or despise and can't stand. It reminds me a bit of the singing style of Bianca Casady of CocoRosie, a childlike squeaking, but Bianca's is rather ethereal, and usually in company with her sister Sierra's operatic style of singing. I can see why Andy Samberg, in particular, would go for her.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

The Youtube comments reflect that hate or love thing. There are people over there who are offended and enraged that she's allowed to do this in public. Well, the same could be said for Bob Dylan in his contemporary vocal state, but no one ever does. Personally, hearing her feels positive to me in the same way I feel positive when I see a fashion model who most people wouldn't consider pretty. I'm often attracted to people who offer something different, even if its doesn't align with standard measures of quality.

And lucky her, to have landed Andy Samberg! He's dorkalicious.

[kissoflife.livejournal.com]

lol, this entry in particular I agree with. This oddly-enjoyable horrorness reminds me of my annoyance with Bob Dylan- she's 'committing caricature,' I would call it, and we're meant to feel a folky, backwoods backwardness, magical-forest glow about it. And yes, Björky to me.
Ditto on the appeal of quirky aesthetics. And ditto on the hots and dork-wuv for Mr. Samberg.
She's gonna kill her voice, over time, doing this.

[mindflankr.livejournal.com]

I didn't LOVE her singing (however, the harp was amazing!)but watching her made me very uncomfortable. It looked strained and painful.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I have a small bit of vocal training, and some of her head/neck movements seemed like they might not have been helping. I have a few friends here who have extensive vocal training, and I'll be looking forward to hearing their thoughts.

[aphrabehn.livejournal.com]

The harp is amazing, for starters.

I hated it at first, but she sort of grew on me as it played on. to me she doesn't sound at all like Bjork, but I like Bjork. Her voice is odd, admittedly, but she has resonance and the ability to hit notes. A lot of Bjork's weirdness stems (I think) from a heavy accent and extremely unusual phrasing.

With this woman, I get the sense she isn't trying to sound good. To sing, at least in the way we think of it. Playing a harp doesn't make singing all that easy, either (forces a bad closed posture.) There's something very stylized here.

And this might get me banned, but she reminded me a bit of Billie Holiday - something in the way she approached notes and her phrasing.

[aphrabehn.livejournal.com]

I just looked at her Wikipedia page and it references using Appalachian melodies in her work. That does make some sense. If you listen to traditional Appalachian folk music, it's kinda weird. Weirdly a-tonal, at least to me.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Interesting! I didn't make the Billie Holiday comparison, but yeah.

If I were a music reviewer, I would have a really hard time with this one and trying to describe/define her. On the one hand, her voice is essentially hideous, but that's not at all the same thing as "sucking." She doesn't suck, she just sounds so different that she needs to be judged by a whole 'nother set of measures than we would use for singers with more normal voices.

Anyway, good on her, I say. She probably takes a lot of shit for getting up there and doing her thing.

[spacechicken.livejournal.com]

I LOVE Joanna Newsom. My brother bought her album after hearing "The Sprout and the Bean" played over the alarming ending of the movie "The Strangers" and brought it over here and played it for me. I listened to it two times through back to back. Who writes songs like this? Who plays the harp? She's incredible. Her voice takes a little getting used to but it really compliments her songs.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

I'm really delighted that I happened to find her. Her sound has given me a lot of food for thought. It's easy to forget that there's so much human vocal diversity out there; just as much as there is body diversity and facial diversity. Yet we get socialized to only want to listen to a few kinds of voices. I listened to Joanna all through the day yesterday. Once I got past the unfamiliar feeling of listening to a completely new-to-me type of voice, her work was really amazing.

[heliopsis.livejournal.com]

She was reliably on pitch, so she's more musical than half the pop stars out there. Her sound is definitely weird, but it reminded me of some of Kate Bush's early vocal effects. I think perhaps her voice has not matured yet.

The thing I found least satisfying about her was that her diction is imprecise, which makes it very hard to figure out what she's saying. There might be some poetry there, but I couldn't tell. All in all, I wouldn't buy an album, but neither would I turn off the radio if she came on.

[lifecollage.livejournal.com]

Ditto on the pitch thing - what makes me claw my ears is when any voice (including my own) just can't seem to hold onto a pitch with a pair of pliers. She's got a deeply quirky way of producing melody, but it's a true melody for all that. I agree with the Bjork and the Kate Bush concepts both.

Also, for the record, I can't *stand* Dylan. I'll read his poetry all day long, but I'd rather put out my own ears with salad tongs than listen to him. The only time I've sat through his music was when Ani Difranco opened for him - and even that was in deference to the older gent who'd driven me to the concert.

[dietrich.livejournal.com]

I love how you managed to propose removing two of your body parts with two different types of tools within this comment. :)

[bookly.livejournal.com]

I normally love British accents, and I've had my fair share of exposure to them, but hers--combined with her diction--didn't help me parse the lyrics at all. Which are actually quite captivating, somehow...

[bookly.livejournal.com]

Ooops. She appears to be born, bred, and trained in the US. But that pronunciation of "floozies" and "choosy" (to cite one example) doesn't sound like anything American I've ever heard.

[kencf0618.livejournal.com]

Vocal wasabi. I liked it, not that I'd dine on it every day. She has, as the French would say, the virtues of her defects -- and she sounds like the inbred love child of Laura Veirs and Diamanda Galas.

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

Thank you for introducing me to Laura Veirs. I went and listened to several of her songs after I read your reply and I'm now hooked. I can see the comparison with Diamonda. In both of their cases as well as Joanna's, the realness and honesty are what make them so distinctive.

[kencf0618.livejournal.com]

My pleasure.

[sideshowbennie.livejournal.com]

I love it! I would much rather hear someone like her sing from the heart in her natural voice than to hear another TIm McGraw or Taylor Swift, who are both well know in Nashville to be unable to carry a tune in a bucket. They use Pro Tools to electronically bring them to pitch and put them on key, both on stage and in the studio. It is more Milli Vanilli than Merle Haggard and it is a lie.

Bless Joanna. We need more of her and less Pro Tools enhanced "singers!!"

[plumtreeblossom.livejournal.com]

After listening to her beautiful songs throughout the day yesterday, I'm in agreement.

[spwebdesign.livejournal.com]

Well, point taken, except she clearly wasn't singing in her natural voice.

It sounds as though she's got a perfectly decent natural voice. The core of the voice sounds healthy and robust. And, as others have mentioned, she has no problems at all with pitch, which is often an indication that something is not right with the voice.

This is not good singing, of course. She is doing something quite artificial to create a vocal effect, but the actual voice is fine. It might not be a few years from now, though. What she's doing to it is taxing and could harm her voice. Such an unhealthy technique is fine for the occasional color or effect, but not for sustained periods of singing.

Catching up on the important stuff...

[weegoddess.livejournal.com]

Wow, I love what you wrote here. As for the vid, I showed J and he asked that I turn it off about a minute in. But I applaud her for doing Her Thing.