Customer Reviews

Comfort of Strangers

5 star:		(19)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Beth Orton's Central Reservation is one of my most loved and worn-out records, and as an artist I hold her in very high regard. Orton's musical integrity, uniqueness and high songwriting standards seemed to be intact from day one of her career, and her voice has always been unmistakably beautiful. No one sounded like Beth Orton back in the mid 90's and nobody does now.

Having said all that, I thought she might have stalled a bit with her last full-length album - 2002's Daybreaker. Daybreaker wasn't without a good song or two, and was actually a pretty good record by most people's standards, it's just that you come to expect so much more from a songwriter of Beth Orton's class. Pleasingly, four years on, any notions of a slide in quality have been well and truly dispelled by her new effort Comfort Of Strangers.

'Strangers is less immediate than previous releases and more understated musically and melodically, but sure enough, little by little, these songs begin to get under your skin. The electronic touches that adorned her earlier work are now gone in favour of a more organic approach courtesy of sympathetic producer Jim O'Rourke (Wilco). He allows Orton's soulful folk/pop songs room to breathe, and in moving away from technology her new material becomes imbued with a real sense of timelessness.

Lyrically too, she's in top form. Orton has a knack of writing about the important stuff, without being.... well.... all important about it. Like the great writer Raymond Carver, Orton sings about love, life and the nature of humanity by observing the little details, cracks and fissures in daily existence that tend to get passed over for the more obvious moments. A good example of this is the beautiful, autumnal 'Safe In Your Arms' which is located, appropriately, at the heart of the album. It's about the role that fear plays in love, but lyrically, it's all shadows, whispers, and wind rustled trees. As songs go, it's vintage Beth Orton, yet it also reflects her maturation as a songwriter. By some margin, 'Don't Need A Reason' has always been my favourite Beth Orton song, but I might need to rethink that now that the lovely 'Safe In your Arms' is in existence. I can't speak highly enough of this wonderfully moving piece of music. But there's plenty more where that come from.

The unusually jaunty opener 'Worms', which for all money sounds like a Fiona Apple homage, can claim one of the best and quirkiest opening lines to an album in recent memory with "worm's don't dance they haven't got the balls". C'mon, how can you top that? - it's pure poetry. Elsewhere, the pop splendour of 'Conceived' is sure to please both old fans and newcomers alike, and the elaborate, finely rendered melodies of the title track and 'Shadow Of A Doubt' get better and better with each play. Actually, the same is true for the rest of this collection.

Comfort Of Strangers is likely to cement Beth Orton's reputation as one of the finest and most important singer-songwriters of her generation and I think that it's finally safe now for Joni to hand over that baton.


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if you're trying to decide whether to shell out the extra five dollars for the bonus cd, i'd like to convince you that it is worth it.

argument #1 = the tracks on the bonus cd are just as strong as the rest of the cd, not an afterthought. no crappy remixes to be found here.
argument #2 = if two years ago beth orton put out a cd with five new songs on it for $5, you would have bought it without hesitation.
argument #3 = title track comfort of strangers #9 is particularly good, with a duet with m ward (who co-wrote the song with beth orton).

similar to pass in time, the comfort of strangers bonus disc is quality material, and well worth the extra dollars.

Ever since "Central Reservation," and other than a couple of tracks -Sweetest Deline" and her collaboration with Terry Callier, I've been missing her full emotional range, her voice and her lyrics back at the center again.

Comfort of Strangers is that promised fulfilled. Jim O'Rourke produced the miracle, reaching for Orton's heart, and recording a set of tracks that is both eclectic and finely wrought together. This is an album, that rare species of CDs that contain no duds, it's all great.

Still, gems abound. Listen for instance to her voice in the gorgeous Comfort To Stragers, Rectify, Feral Children, Safe in Your Arms, or the lyrics and groove of Worms. She can sings!

Jim O'Rourke's gift is in the nuances and details, here he offers precisely what each song needed. Some almost a wisp of guitar and a quiet bass, or piano, strings or horns in those places where it was the thing to have.

This is a great album, an obvious choice for anyone who'd followed her career, a perfect place to start in your way to Central Reservation, or just a tremendous addtion to any respectable collection.

Having loved the bassy beat-driven Daybreaker, Beth goes back to her Central Reservation roots with a more acoustic and "earthy" sounding album. Her voice still plays wonderfully amidst the poppy, Carole King-esque, guitar tunes. I have yet to find a heartstring tugger on this album, but I am sure in time one will emerge. Check out the music video for the first single as well. It is a good summarization of what you can expect on the album.

Beth Orton is a talented and unique singer-songwriter with a consistent sense of releasing good music. The soul of Beth Orton songs have always been two things - her great voice and her fantastic lyrics. "Safe In Your Arms" was my first favorite off this album. Next, "Heart of Soul" a more upbeat piece to break up the slower songs. If you're a fan of Beth's or new to her, this CD is for you. Excellent music from beginning to end. It's different in style to Trailer Park and Central Reservation, but all in all a great album.

Really puzzled by so many bad reviews of this great batch of
songs. My expectations were so low, and these songs are so
incredibly likeable. And the "bad sound" is really just a very
nice, very informal, very fresh recording. I'm not even a fan
of Beth Orton's, and I think this is just one of the most
wonderful and rewarding efforts I've heard in years.

I got this album from a friend who told me that it was one of those albums that had really gotten under his skin, and that I had to listen to it a few times to give it a chance. I liked some of the songs right off: worms, place aside, safe in your arms; I was definitely prone to skipping around a lot. As I kept listening, though, I started to see new things in almost all of the songs and the album as a whole really started to get to me. Her lyrics are incredible, phrasing things that I had felt but hadn't been able to articulate, and she has a particular way of emphasizing the important things with subtle vocal changes, like the repeated lines at the end of pieces of sky: "there's so many people who need to know that you're still with them even when they don't know" and her voice rises and almost cracks on the 'you're'. In contrast to the sort of numb feel of the rest of the song, it highlights the desperate attempt to accept that it's over and time to move on. I find myself doing that a lot with this album, analyzing little things...and I recommend it to pretty much anyone who likes that kind of thing, especially someone trying to come to terms with their own complicated relationship issues (which, really, is most people).

WOW. It's really special to feel like you're experiencing the evolution and growth of an artist along with them. Beth Orton is so stripped-down, uncovered and real (at all times, not just this CD) that I feel like I'm taking up space on this planet. As noted by earlier reviews, this CD takes a few listens to absorb into your system. But when it does, you are there. It's stripped down, earthy and even has a lit grit in - like it was just picked fresh from a garden. The songs individually are excellent, but fit together even better. Where to start? I'm not sure. Personal tastes are just that. I think I love each and every song in its own way. Special to me are Shadow of a Doubt, (Heart) of Soul, Heartland Truckstop, Shopping Trolley and A Place Aside. I just can't choose one. Thanks to Jim O'Rourke for helping bring out this new twist on Beth. It adds great flavor to the drink of life.

I remember reading somewhere around the time the "Daybreaker" was released that Beth meant it to conclude the trilogy of albums that included "Trailer Park" and "Central Reservation". Not included in the "trilogy" was a "Best Bit" EP issued between 1st and 2nd CD but, musically, it definitely belonged there. That body of work appeared to be of dual nature; alternating between electronically colored, hypnotic at times, extended grooves and acoustic, guitar only, folk songs. I absolutely loved that part of her music where she applied the experience gained while with William Orbit or Chemical Brothers.

In the current album, "Comfort of Strangers", she is more consistent than she ever was. The music is more in the "urban folk" category (if there is such a term). The frugal instrumentation of bass, drums, guitar and/or piano puts so much more emphasis on Beth Orton's voice. The occasional touches of cello and viola are reminiscent of her prior arrangements. A harmonica or accordion, in couple of songs, just adds to quiet drama of her lyrics. The music on this album swings; swings in the rock sense, of course. The ever pulling rhythm is always there; sometimes loud and clear in front, other times muted yet pulsating behind. I rarely focus on the lyrics but they are a treat here; "...I don't care how much religion you've got, you've got to put a lot of love in your heart (whole lotta love in your heart)". Was it a concious Led Zeppelin quote? If only the reprinted lyrics in the booklet were easier to read I would have told you more about them. The focus on her voice and lyrics is what probably makes the songs very short. They are tight and to the point. Makes me yearning for more.

The song "Conceived" received a lot of publicity prior to album's release and it foretells quite well of what to expect. It doesn't necessarily mean that it is the best song. The beauty of this CD is in the fact that people can find their own favorites, and on top of that, the favorites might be different depends on the time or type of day.

In summary, Beth Orton found her own voice, departed from the influence of her prior associations and delivered something that is very personal, contemporary (without trying to be trendy) and speaking to us about what really matters; our relationships.

Beth Orton has a quality to her music that is not always immediately apparent upon first listening. Her songs, if given the chance, get inside of you and almost always find a permenant place there. Her voice, both in her vocal delivery and in her lyrics, have a beautiful, incomparable quality, wonderfully musical and poetic, if often difficult to understand -- obviously, deeply personal, yet ambiguous enough that the listener (as with any great art) can find their own personal meaning therewithin.

With this album, "The Comfort of Strangers", Beth Orton brings her acoustic sensibilities, so prevalent from her live perfomances, more fully into the studio, creating her softest and most hauntingly beautiful album to date. I will leave it to others to expound on each particular track, but I would be remiss if I didn't point out that the "Limited Edition" disk contains (among others) two of the most beauiful songs ever recorded by any artist: "What We Begin", and "On My Way Home" -- each of which, like many of Ms. Orton's songs, draws you back time and again almost like an addiction you can't live without.

Of all the little-known performers I've stumbled across in my years of musical exploration, Beth Orton has been, and remains, an absolute favorite.