July Flame

Laura Veirs | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (January 12, 2010)
• Original Release Date: January 12, 2010
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Raven Marching Band Records
• ASIN: B002W1HBIE
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Music
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #96,819 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Review

''The magnificent Portland songwriter delves into the mystic, crafting spare, entrancing pop songs as informed by folk music as they are indie rock. July Flame takes its title from a type of peach, and its content is just as sweet and irresistible.'' --Rolling Stone

''It s full of texture... You almost want to run your hands across it and feel the nicks in the wood grain, or order it off the appetizer menu in your town s new warehouse-district restaurant run by a ruddy-faced genius with a beard. It s full of layered folk and indie-rock bucolia and plain-spoken but stretchy-thinking language, wherein everyday energies or objects transubstantiate into other, metaphorically richer ones. There are some great, seemingly unforced, séancelike moments here... (Veirs) still makes cagey, careful music, but it s easing up, getting warmer.'' --The New York Times

Product Description

Laura Veirs seventh album July Flame, which Colin Meloy of The Decemberists calls ''the best album of 2010,'' explores the emotion of mid-summer. Drenched in wood smoke, sunlight, pollinators, pastoral dales, fireworks and warm nights, her lyrics explore the
dichotomy between one s desire for permanence and security and the realization that such things rarely exist. Nowhere on the album is this inherent tension more crystallized than on the title track. Composed mostly in the barn behind her house in Portland, OR, July Flame is a relatively stripped-down folk record highlighting
Veirs masterful finger picking guitar and confident vocals. ''Laura s like the queen bee and my ear is her hive; she nests and makes honey in the hairs of my cochlea,'' says Jim James of My Morning Jacket (who sings on several tracks). The album breaks from Veirs previous full-band efforts, although
many of the same players make appearances on the album, including longtime collaborators Karl Blau and Steve Moore. String arrangements are featured more on this album than on
others; the brilliant improviser Eyvind Kang plays viola on many songs, and legendary arranger Stephen Barber composed hauntingly beautiful string quartet arrangements for three songs.
July Flame is the sixth album (and third released on her own label Raven Marching Band) that Laura and producer Tucker Martine (Sufjan Stevens, The Decemberists, Laura Gibson) have made together. Recorded and mixed at their home, the songwriting, arrangements, production and performances create a fully realized piece of art that inspires reflection and calm in a world that spins
unsteady.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Inspired, dreamy, a breath of fresh air. January 13, 2010

By Adarsh Amin

Format:Audio CD

The Colorado-born and Portland-based artist's seventh album is a resultant breath of fresh air.
Conceived from a chance summer meeting with an unusual peach at a local farmer's market, which also spawned the album's name and title track, "July Flame" - a variety of peach- is a break from a self-proclaimed songwriting slump - and a welcome one at that.
The wistful songstress takes a more stripped-down approach compared with recent efforts, the mood erring toward the ripe and summery and the simple arrangements leaving plenty of spaces for her crystalline-as-mountain-air vocals to swoop and glide.
Here, instead of the fascination with water, which has coursed through all her albums since the beautiful "Carbon Glacier", it's the sun that dominates "July Flame".
Tracks such as "Sun Is King" and "Summer Is the Champion" speak poetically of that season's emotional thaw.
The album offers an airy, bucolic, for the most part drum-less, sound, effectively returning Veirs to the fingerpicking folk milieu that characterised her early records, showing a world of organic imagery where troubles "seep into the dirty ground". She may be midthirties, but "July Flame" sees Veirs' explore the emotions of a hazy mid-summer with wide-eyed youthfulness - most notably on the gloriously bright "Summer Is The Champion".
The title track, meanwhile, epitomises a long-shadowed July twilight....
The erstwhile geologist and inveterate nature lover is still packing her songs with floral, orological and riverine metaphors, but "July Flame" also finds her exploring new, more direct lyrical avenues, like the unabashed romanticism of "When You Give Your Heart" or the unequivocal "Carole Kaye" - the real curio of the set, an ingenuous tribute to Frank Zappa's session bassist that showcases Laura Veirs' humble-natured song writing, whilst also providing credentials for her own deserved reverence.
"Make Something Good", a rasping, piano and strings-ornamented duet with My Morning Jacket's Jim James, closes out the album.
The 13 tracks, recorded at Veirs's own home studio or 'the Barn' with new partner and long-time producer Tucker Martine, have such an unassuming, homespun quality that you're constantly surprised by how mesmerising is the tapestry of sounds and how expansive and richly textured the songs are.
My favourite tracks: "Make Something Good", "Carol Kaye", "Wide-Eyed" , "Legless", "July Flame' and " Summer Is the Champion".
Enjoy!
Carbon Glacier
Saltbreakers Read more ›

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars "Emerald Fields from Steer Manure" January 13, 2010

By Mark D. Prouse

Format:Audio CD

It's almost painful, how beautiful this new Laura Veirs CD is. With six albums now, and an EP (there was another, self-released title as well, currently out of print), it has become clear to me that the woman is not capable of creating anything less than captivating ... and she keeps getting better. JULY FLAME instantly became my favorite with the very first listen!

Now, for some, Laura Veirs' flat, girlish voice will be an acquired taste. It was for me; my initial exposure was her Carbon Glacier, a CD I bought based purely on reviews. I would not have given two cents for her singing ability - at first. But the songs crept under my skin, their organic yet chilly tones haunting me for weeks until I had to hear more. I ended up getting all of the Veirs' recordings I could get my hands on, and each one I picked up was a keeper.

The main reason, of course, given Laura's somewhat expressionless voice, is the quality of the songs, and the creativity of both her lyrics and the arrangements. On JULY FLAME, she has stripped back some of the heavy layers and most of the electronics of her last two albums, Year of Meteors and Saltbreakers, but this doesn't mean she has abandoned complexity. These songs are all intricate little symphonies with melodies that take unexpected turns and words that unfold like the pages of a book I can't put down. Veirs continues to use the natural world and the cosmos as the primary sources for her imagery, but she uses them to paint lovely portraits of people, herself, and of pure emotions.... Her poetry can be challenging, using odd things like "steer manure" and a "stampeding buffalo" to describe impulses of the heart and spirit; stuff like "iron filings" and an "organ pipe" that one would not expect to find in a song lyric, and weaving it all into utterly gorgeous, dream-like stories of love, work, survival and death. One song, about a soldier killed in battle, is drawn from Rimbaud, and sits along side the rest of Veirs' wholly original poetry quite naturally. She lets the images do the talking, never preaching or lecturing, yet delivering potent messages just the same.

The instrumentation all through JULY FLAME is constantly interesting, with Laura's fine guitar and banjo playing, Eyvind Kang's viola, Steve Moore's keyboards, and Karl Blau's harmony vocals providing most of the base. Other instruments like saxophones, vibes, a thumb piano, clarinet, keyboards, upright bass, percussion, even a string quartet, are added here and there, but the overall sound is uncluttered and clean. This set is so excellent throughout, that it's hard to pick the best songs, but the standouts for me are "Sun is King," "I Can See Your Tracks," "Life Is Good Blues," "Silo Song," "Little Deschutes," "Summer Is The Champion," and the aptly titled closer, "Make Something Good." Yes, she did "make something good" -- all of these songs have something to say, something to give. In addition, Ms. Veirs' singing is better than ever; in fact, I don't think anyone, even with a better singing voice, would be able to improve upon these performances. There's a perfect meld of vocal, lyric writing and music here. Already, I can hardly wait for the next Laura Veirs project! Read more ›

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Found Treasure July 26, 2010

By tesg

Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase

This was one of those "You may also like" Amazon suggestions. All I can say is...How did I go this long without ever hearing of Laura Veirs. She even lives in my hometown for crying out loud.

This is my find of the year thus far. Folky, poppy, and sometimes retro (the 70's vibe of "Summer is the Champion" is fantastic), this disc just knocked me sideways. It was the perfect disc at the perfect time for me. It will be in heavy rotation in the car CD changer for at least the rest of the year.

I'll be catching up on the rest of her catalog if you need me.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Gorgeous, rich harmonies March 8, 2010

By Alison

Format:Audio CD

I first heard of Laura Veirs from her fabulous duet with Colin Meloy in The Decemberists "Crane Wife" album. I then fell in love with her Saltbreakers album. July Flame is even better than Saltbreakers.

As other reviewers have said, Laura's voice is an acquired taste. It doesn't have the strength or prettiness of someone like Neko Case or Alison Krauss. But its clear simplicity grows on you quickly. Her voice reminds me of shape-note singers. That being said, I don't think I'd enjoy listening to an entire album of her voice alone.

July Flame impresses me most with its rich harmonies. They bring a haunting, ethereal quality to her songs. I think "July Flame," "Sleeper in the Valley," and "Wide-Eyed, Legless" have the most complex and interesting harmonies. "Carol Kaye" is one song I particularly like where Laura's solo voice predominates and is pleasantly sweet. Parts of the album have a hint of country, but not enough to turn off someone like me who dislikes country.