Customer Reviews

Temperamental Angel

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Evan Beigel does it again with Tempermental Angel.

Pop Stops. Star Newspapers

The promise is fulfilled!

Last summer, I reviewed Girl In The Moon, gilli moon's debut CD, which I stumbled upon through the Internet (its "Girl in the Moon" was a hugely popular MP3 download, and one of my favorite songs of last year).

Now gilli moon, a Californian these days by way of Australia, by way of Italy (and known to her family as Gilli Aliotti), is releasing her second solo disc this month, and it's an even stronger collection than her first. An amazingly mature and complex album, Temperamental Angel speaks to the bare emotions of love, hate, empowering sensuality and hand-tying vulnerability in all of us.

The album opens with "Communication," a spoken word piece which observes "we all have different masks we wear. We are complex individuals with complex personalities ... I am sweet, loving, angelic, and angry, unheard, demonic ..."

Moon bravely examines these dichotomies throughout Temperamental Angel. In the title track, her whispery, lilting upper register brings to mind a young Kate Bush, mixed with the angst of Alanis Morissette, as she admits "I'm a sucker for conventional romance" and considers "what if I had never experienced this period in my life?"

Temperamental Angel delivers with a wide swatch of styles and confessions. In "Naked," the bass cuts a sinuous groove as she admits with unembarrassed sensual honesty, "I like getting naked with you."

In "Plenty," she melds a tinkly piano with a silky smooth bass and a quivering-on-the-edge of discovery vocal as she asks "will I cross the river to the other side of paradise? ... maybe ... will I see the rainbow like the fairytales my mother told so plenty?"

The guitars crunch and twine beneath her as she quavers and twists, small whispering voices answering more assured declarations, a symphony of inner turmoil uncovered and recorded.

Then in "Swimming," a somber piano backs her as she sings a deeply emotional, stirringly beautiful hymn of loss, revealing that "I lost what I never thought I'd find/I'm swimming dark and blind ...was it all a lie?" She struts and growls in the pounding "Disgrace," gets confrontationally funky in "Touch Me," and slips into forgivably gorgeous schmaltz with the Burt Bacharach-like horn arrangement of the melancholic "Why Do You Love Me Still?"

Temperamental Angel proves that you don't have to be on a major label with a million dollar budget to make a great record. Because gilli moon's not, and Temperamental Angel is. Seek this one out (and read the diary of the making of the album) at www.gillimoon.com.

John Everson Music Critic The Star Newspapers, Chicago

REVIEW Jan 01 by Jacky Gleeson gilli moon is one helluva busy woman. She is a founding member, President and US representative of Songsalive!, www.songsalive.org, she has had her hands full with all of this and a couple of music projects, including Jessica Christ, her own solo career and her own record-label Warrior Girl Music www.warriorgirl.com but she has still managed to combine the last two aspects of her life in the release of the first album on her new label, Temperamental Angel.

Reading the lyrics on this album (separately from listening to the music) is not like reading poetry, with rhymes in couplets or other well-used techniques in today's songwriting: it's like reading a collection of short stories about different aspects, fragments of and journeys within the author's life. Then you turn the CD on and are immediately blown away by the ferocity of the mood-swings. Right from the opening track one is left searching aimlessly for the right superlatives to describe the travels this record takes your moods through.

There is a multitude of influences, sounds and moods on this record. In the opening track, Communication, we're given a sense of Pink Floyd's One Of My Turns ("The Wall" 1979) where there are two characters: one of which is talking but the other doesn't seem to be in the same room. Then we're introduced to gilli's inimitable singing and songwriting style in the title track: Breathy, sultry vocals: a cross between Nicholece K Garner & Tori Amos. The mood then flows through love-of-life (Plenty), the expression of unbridled sexuality (Naked), through the heart-stabbing pain of Swimming, the pure-hate of Disgrace, the musical tug-o-war around the emotion of the Why Do You Love Me Still, the "early-stages in the relationship/`love makes you croon to the moon in June'/there will be no end/this is the one" love of Touch Me to the swirling, almost Phantom Of The Opera/ENZSO balladic instrumentation Alive to close.

Many people can be thankful to gilli moon's input to song and music writers in Sydney and LA, and all the accolades in her direction prior to this release confirm just what she has been saying all these years. Now everyone can see that there is a lot more to gilli moon than actor/songwriter/record executive/artist/record producer/lead-singer - there is a passionate woman that has a lot to be thankful for, a lot to express and a lot of hard work ahead from the success of her debut album Temperamental Angel on Warrior Girl Music http://www.warriorgirlmusic.com

Temperamental Angel hits the stores across the United States on April 10.

PG (Jacky) Gleeson p_terg@hotmail.com, Sounds Review, Australia

Gilli Moon's second album opens with a spoken word piece that's reminiscent of Laurie Anderson. Then the rest of the record unfolds and reveals itself to be a unique mix of accessible hooks, passionate vocals and heartfelt lyrics. Moon effectively captures a variety of moods with her music. The title track has its fair share of Alanis Morrissette's explosive nature. By contrast the ballad "Why Do you Love Me Still?" is tender and sweet and should top the lists in a fair universe. She's an intriguing new voice to listen out for. Anna Maria Stjärnell www.collectedsounds.com, Sweden

gilli moon Temperamental Angel Warrior Girl Music * * * * * * * (7 out of 10 stars) Producer: gilli moon and evan j. beigel Top Cuts: "Temperamental Angel", "Naked", Disgrace". Since 1996 this Aussie artist has recorded for two different labels. On her latest album, moon broadens the boundaries of musical structure and sonic soundscapes with an approach that Patti Smith and Sonic Youth would appreciate. Combining poetry with techno rock, she explores a plethora of emotions and styles. From a spoken-word intro to her use of exotic instrumentation, the songs are eye opening. This is an album that encourages repeated play, as the listener discovers new surprises on every track.

Bernard Baur, Music Connection, Los Angeles