The Fall review

Norah Jones, a girl with guitar

Norah Jones has managed to define herself among the young, beautiful and talented performers from the very beginning creating her own inimitable and always recognizable sounding, composed of her soft but powerful vocals, interesting tunes and complicated accompaniments often including orchestra arrangements. As for her lyrics the things are not that simple here either – starting from her very first compositions Jones has recommended herself as a singer performing soulfully the songs with philosophic texts and simple romantic ballads. Norah takes the plots from life itself, she travels quite a lot and observes other people’s living in most different societies with most differed religions. At the same time the artist always remains herself – the audience loves her scene image of a girl with guitar as well as her wonderfully sincere songs. This year Norah Jones’ fourth album The Fall is released to sign some slight changes in the singer’s style – this time rock is added to the selection of genres mixed in her music to give it even more of the fine piquancy.

Somewhat sad, cynical and nostalgic notes on The Fall

Another significant difference between The Fall and all of other Norah Jones’ works is that it is her first work after the breakup with bassist Lee Alexander which has made her music obtain somewhat sad, cynical and nostalgic notes. Therefore there are even less songs of happy love on the album and even more reflection. The album opens with a melodious composition Chasing Pirates with contagious drums and guitars – it turns out that such instrumental background only underlines her vocals and even reveals some new sides of it. The song Even Though is in this respect an example of an amazing bass line combined with splendid tubes and a slow and very beautiful ballad Light As A Feather definitely proves one of the album’s highlights. The track Young Blood is another example of how a little portion of rock can change the familiar sounding making it a bit more sullen and melancholic. The composition You've Ruined Me is devoted directly to breaking up and surprises with its veiled despair whereas Back To Manhattan tells of life after this change, returning to solitude and memories. Another highlight is the song Stuck with a contagious blues rhythm and the album closer is a charming composition Man Of The Hour in which blues, jazz and soul are joined together.

Music is Norah Jones’ blood

It goes without saying that none of the studio albums of today is recorded without producers’ participation and Norah invites only the best to record her works. Thus Jacquire King known for his work with Kings of Leon, Tom Waits and Modest Mouse has worked on her fourth record among others. Due to his efforts Norah Jones has realized her idea of a record with rock-elements different from all of her previous works. Now we can not only compare today’s Norah with the yesterday’s one, but also suppose that when she has finally decided to move away from the formula she has chosen at the beginning she will continue looking for a new sound. At the same time we can have no doubt that everything is going to be all right with this singer as she has never chased commercial success and simply does what she likes best for music is in her blood – Jones’ is the daughter of Ravi Shankar renowned for his masterful sitar playing. Thus no matter what Norah’s next record is going to be like it will surely be of a good quality, sincere and personal as the wonderfully beautiful album The Fall.