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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Enchanté, April 20, 2009
Seven stars! The music press is abuzz with Natasha Kahn as heir apparent to the genre inhabited by Kate Bush, Bjork and other not-so-easily-pigeon-holed femme fatales. To be sure, comparisons are in order, but only as points of reference. My first listen to this spell-binding collection reminded me of the first time I heard Kate Bush's "Hounds Of Love", a percussion driven, minimally orchestrated production that showcased a spectacular vocal instrument. Like Bush, Khan modulates her voice effortlessly from a whisper to a howl, all while achieving a stratospheric range, as in the opener "Glass." She also has an appreciation for "less is more" in her instrumental arrangements. On some, synths glisten above and rumble below primal drumming and beguiling multi-track vocal splashes. On others, a simple piano accompaniment is all that's needed. All of the songs share equal merit (a pleasant surprise, considering the abundance of first-four-song fizzles), and each is thoroughly engaging. Her lyrics abound in flights of fancy, allusions to knights in crystal armor and emerald cities. While they could easily sound pretentious and precious, as is the case with some of her contemporaries, she breathes them to life as they intertwine with and inhabit each song. In some she conjures deeply insightful moments. She laments in Sleep Alone, "lonely, lonely, lonely his mother told me/ the dream of love is a two hearted dream." Or solemnly and perhaps topically in Peace Of Mind, "If I ever get back down / find a map that takes me back / through the wounded, through the wars / to a time that came before" And the poignant and perhaps self referent Traveling Woman, the most moving song of the set, "Never fall in love with potential / `cause you can't see it with your own eyes / All the pretty faces and sorry words / can take away your pride." Natasha Khan's world is full of pride and potential. May those qualities guide her through what promises to be a long and fruitful journey. I eagerly await the next step.
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13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
That Pseudo-Intellectual Is Wrong, April 28, 2009
The miserable-type (I read his other reviews. Sad.) that claimed this is corporate music dressed up for people who "don't know any better" was condescendingly insulting your intelligence. Don't buy into it. If he'd just done some research on Natasha Khan maybe he'd have seen more clearly what she was after. It also helps to listen to more than the first 3 seconds of each song (on other sites that actually let you preview the whole song), as these songs take a lot of twists and turns.
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
To be made of glass, April 7, 2009
It's like climbing a long velvet rope sewn with golden charms and jewels. That description sums up the experience of listening to Bat For Lashes (aka Natasha Khan), even in her lesser songs. And fortunately "Two Suns" doesn't really have any lesser songs -- just a steady stream of painfully exquisite, crystalline pop that focus on the feeling of love that's gone.
"In the street's broadways I seek... him whom my soul loveth," she sings softly in the introductory song, before switching to a mix of tribal drums and wafting keyboard. .
After that, she spreads out into a string of love songs -- in fact, this entire album is pretty heavy on those. Most are bittersweet descriptions of an affair falling apart ("I drove past true love once, in a dream/Like a house that caught fire, it burned and flamed"), but there are some beautifully idealistic moments as well.
Along the way, Khan dabbles in some stompy synthy dance, a hymnlike freak-folk ballad backed by a choir, and the warmly off-kilter "Traveling Woman," and a finale that evokes old wooden stages, toy pianos and an old theatre being shut down ("No more spotlights/coming down from heaven... and already my voice is fading/goodbye, my dears/and into the big city...").
Fortunately she doesn't abandon her signature sound, which is that of an old fantasy story mutating into a beautiful, slightly wicked dream -- swirling pop, haunting piano ballads, the soaring and unnerving echoes of "Siren" and its synth-studded companion "Pearl's Song," ethereal melodies swathed in shimmering keyboard, and the exotic sweet danciness of "Two Planets." But the absolute peak of the whole thing has to be "Daniel," an catchily effervescent ode to a man with a "flame in his heart."
One of the biggest questions that comes to mind when listening to "Two Suns" is -- why is the music industry flooded with no-talent pop hacks, when such exquisitely vibrant music is right there for the listening? It's an album with stunning vocals and instrumentation, and lyrics that evoke images of forests on fire, magicians, crystal cities, and an alter ego Khan calls Pearl (who is either a femme fatale or a fantasy traveler).
Khan's music is, if possible, even more beautiful than before, mainly because she's managed to polish the instrumentals even further. In most songs she weaves together a shimmering wall of hauntingly silky keyboard with drums, violins, sharp beats and painfully pretty piano, but sometimes she also pares it down to the bare essentials ("Peace of Mind").
But Khan's voice is one of the loveliest things in this album -- she can sing powerfully or wistfully, and she even shows that she can manage a song almost a capella ("Peace of Mind" again). Her songwriting is even better: she can conjure powerful emotions with vivid swathes of words ("I drove past true love once, in a dream/Like a house that caught fire, it burned and flamed"). It's almost sensual.
"Two Suns" is a lush, lovely album that shows how much Natasha Khan's music has grown in the last year, and reminds you of the dark, beautiful places just out of reach.
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