Customer Reviews

Greatest Hits V.1

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If an epigram is a cute, witty little poem, I have to wonder if there is a word for something similar in song form? The Lorraine Bowen Experience offers dozens of cute and clever little songs. As soon as I get one out of my head, another gets stuck there.

I suppose Ms. Bowen's work grew out her stage act, but it seems she self-describes her work as harking back to pre-stadium rock days when radio hits would give listeners some memorable lyrics and a catchy tune. And her songs do just that. Hook after hook snags me, as does her (typically?) British clever use of wordplay in her lyrics. Additionally, they are in a number of different styles and with a wide range of instruments.

In world over-inundated with love songs, her everyday-existence subjects are fresh and accessible to urbanites and suburbanites alike. Someone is opening his mail on the bus. The market vendors pinch off too many spinach leaves. And what's more natural while waiting for one's laundry to ponder the woman running the launderette? These personal sketches of the small details of life are comforting and beautiful.

There is I must admit a disconnect in my American experience with the melancholy of a Brighton Beach experience or with kippers for breakfast. But that is no doubt a real bonus for any Anglophile for the intimate views they give into life in the UK. All in all, this disc and her others give good listening because the music is thought out and varied and the lyrics all written deliberately to say something - something interesting.