PJ Harvey : Releases >>
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White Chalk >>
This carnival ride to the netherworld of the soul is PJ Harvey's most dizzyingly radical work since the raw pulse and grind of her 1993 debut. It's also entirely different. Harvey's created an emotionally fractured Gothic fairytale that rides on her spare, tattered piano playing and her voice, which she turns into a fragile siren's call: high, airy, and imperiled, and made otherworldly by a labyrinth of echo. Instead of pop tunes, Harvey offers an 11-song cycle that's the metaphorical story of a breakup in which the Devil, a drug-induced nightmare, and a seemingly bottomless pit of despair all play a part. At the end, in "The Mountain," her banshee wails conclude a journey so oblique it's worthy of David Lynch or Neil Gaiman. Flood, who co-produced Harvey's 1998 epic rock breakthrough Is This Desire? with her, reprises that role, but White Chalk is more chamber music--and a dark chamber at that. --Ted Drozdowski
1991-2004: Peel Sessions >>
PJ Harvey does her best work naked. For all the tantalizing changes in direction over the past 15 years, it was the British songwriter's barebones debut, Rid of Me (and its raw companion piece, 4-Track Demos), that made the greatest impression. These recordings from the late John Peel's celebrated BBC Radio show see her returning time and again to her basic blues roots, offering delightfully bruised takes on both early classics like "Sheela-Na-Gig," from her first performance on the show, through "You Come Through," a track that was recorded at a tribute shortly after Peel's passing. Along the way, there are plenty of rarities, stylistic diversions, and traces of dark humor to make Harvey fans wish the package could have been twice as long. --Aidin Vaziri
C'Mon Billy, Pt. 2 >>
Perfect Day Elise, Pt. 1 >>
Good Fortune >>
Perfect Day Elise, Pt. 1 >>
Wind, Pt. 2 >>
Good Fortune, Pt. 2 >>
Wind, Pt. 1 >>
Good Fortune, Pt. 1 >>
