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Red Letter Year

Ani DiFranco
3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews) | More about this product
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Music

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Biography

Alt folk-rocker, women's rights activist and feminist icon Ani DeFranco was born in Buffalo, New York. Her highly personal, often political lyrics, cover a range of socially relevant subjects including poverty, sexual abuse, racism, sexism and homophobia. She is also a political activist, campaigning for Ralph Nader in 2000 and in 2004 she supported Democratic Presidential-hopeful Dennis… Read more in Amazon's Ani DiFranco Store

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Red Letter Year + Canon + Reprieve
Price For All Three: $45.96

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  • This item: Red Letter Year ~ Ani DiFranco

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  • Canon ~ Ani DiFranco

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Product Details

  • Audio CD (September 30, 2008)
  • Original Release Date: September 30, 2008
  • Number of Discs: 1
  • Label: Righteous Babe
  • ASIN: B001D7T276
  • In-Print Editions: Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
  • Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.com Sales Rank: #13,832 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

    Popular in this category: (What's this?)

    #77 in  Music > Alternative Rock > Alternative Styles > Alternative Folk

    •  Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
 
1. Red Letter Year
2. Alla This
3. Present/Infant
4. Smiling Underneath
5. Way Tight
6. Emancipated Minor
7. Good Luck
8. The Atom
9. Round A Pole
10. Landing Gear
11. Star Matter
12. Red Letter Year Reprise

Editorial Reviews

Buffalo News, September 21, 2008

"...celebratory and joyous..."

Product Description

"I've got myself a new mantra," Ani DiFranco shares on her new studio album. "It says `Don't forget to have a good time.'" This attitude has clearly influenced the dozen tunes on Red Letter Year, which celebrate existence, profess love and tackle thorny political issues with an infectious sense of glee. It's one of Ani's most joyous records to date.

And it has been a long time coming. Red Letter Year was sculpted over the course of two years, a period in which Ani continued to hone her songwriting, performing and recording skills, all the while balancing her new role as a mom. "I think I sorely needed to be slowed down, and finally a little person came along powerful enough to do it," Ani reflects. The end result is an album of focused, layered, panoramic music.

Ani's band - upright bassist Todd Sickafoose, vibraphonist/percussionist Mike Dillon and drummer Allison Miller - is a major source of Red Letter Year's singular personality. On "Emancipated Minor," Miller's driving beat tethers to Ani's killer electric guitar hook, while Sickafoose's bass adds the perfect counterpoint to Ani's acoustic guitar work on "Way Tight". And on "Alla This," Dillon's vibes are as rich and open-minded as Ani's defiant, anthemic lyrics.

Add to the inspired, re-invigorated Ani the uncanny production skills of Napolitano (Joseph Arthur, The Twilight Singers, Squirrel Nut Zippers), the otherworldly string arrangements of long time collaborator Sickafoose, and the inspired playing of guests such as Jon Hassell on trumpet (Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel, Ry Cooder), and you've got the makings of a DiFranco classic.

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Customer Reviews

23 Reviews
5 star:
 (8)
4 star:
 (7)
3 star:
 (3)
2 star:
 (2)
1 star:
 (3)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
3.7 out of 5 stars (23 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Finally, the band works!, October 1, 2008
I was always crazy about Ani's solo work, going back to the early 90's, but I have always regretted her decision to try to develop a full band -- the amazing qualities of her musicianship and songs never translated to an upright bass, terrible horns, and marginal rotating bandmates. However, the new album achieves some awesome heights, particularly the tracks 'Red Letter Year', 'Alla This', and 'Smiling Underneath'. Her signature percussive guitar attack is all but gone, but I think she finally may have found a sound with her band. The drums are extraordinary throughout, and some very interesting effects/sounds pepper many of the songs. However, even more so than the improvements in the band, Ani's voice has reached an incredible maturity. In many songs, there's a simple (yet very strong) sweetness to it, and very seldom do you hear the overly-affected vocal tremolo that has marred her singing style on the last few albums. If you take away the inexplicably horrible final track (which sounds like a bunch of drunk high school band castoffs trying very unsuccessfully to sound "fun"), this album is truly a treat. Highly recommended, especially for those who may have been avoiding her recent albums due to the reduction of the visceral results of her and her acoustic guitar. Great job Ani!!
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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars Eh. Just ok., December 1, 2008
By Crystal M. Russell (Little Rock, AR) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
I've been a die-hard Ani fan for 12 years. I buy each album she puts out without question, and will probably consider to do so, hoping she will shock and awe me as she once did in the days of Dilate and Little Plastic Castles.

Red Letter Year seems to be at the bottom of a downhill slide that started when she began playing with the voice-synthesizer and instrumentals. So much of Red Letter Year has been so overly-synthesized that you can barely hear her voice, much less make out what she's saying. Sure, some of it rings through, and you get those wonderfully Ani lyrics, but, despite much searching, I can hardly find anything here that reminds me of why I love her.

Normally, I find one or two (or three or four) songs per album that I replay incessently for weeks and months on end. There's nothing here that made me want to listen to the CD more than once. I am saddened by it, but hope that Ani will make a comeback with something more relevent, something more "ani", for her old, diehard fans.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Conquering/being conquered by New Orleans, October 10, 2008
By Paul Allaer (Cincinnati) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)      
Ani Difranco relocated from Buffalo to New Orleans, and this has clearly had a profound effect on her writing and musical style. And at all that (plus having become a mom) hasn't stopped Ani from continuing to be the prolific writer that she's always been. This is Ani's 18th proper studio album (never mind the many live albums and compilations).

"Red Letter Year" (12 tracks, 47 min.) brings a renewed focus from Ani. After a disappointing opening title track (yes, we get it, you don't like Bush) that is simply not interesting musically, the album kicks into gear with "Alla This", which immediately brings forward the influence of New Orleans and the Louisiana music underground. The album features plenty of horns and other brass music, and Ani makes the best of it. There remain of course several tracks of more traditional Ani songs, sparse, with acoustic guitars (such as on "Star Matter"). One of my favorite tracks is "The Atom", a beautiful pensive tune with such lines as "I had a great great uncle who worked on the atomic bomb/He got a nobel price in physics and a place in this song", hehe. The album closer is an instrumental reprise of the title track, a full brass all-out re-interpretation, just beautiful.

In all, "Red Letter Year" is a most welcome addition to the rich Ani Difranco catalog. I saw Ani in concert earlier this year at the Langerado festival in South Florida, and she brought a tremendous set, playing many of the classics along with a couple tracks from this album (which by then was not out yet).
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars An arrival!
Taken with permission [...] Michael Devlin, Editor

Much of DiFranco's catalogue is autobiographic, so being a fan of Ani is somewhat of a serial experience. Read more
Published 25 days ago by M. Devlin

3.0 out of 5 stars Not the Ani Difranco I remember...
Well, I was pleasantly surprised to find a free Ani Difranco download, but after my first listen of this track I have to say I'm pretty disappointed. Read more
Published 2 months ago by M. Annabi

1.0 out of 5 stars Another dose of TRASH fron a Once Amazing Artist
Ani has become the Lindsey Buckingham of her generation. Once an amazing guitarist and lyricist with wicked hooks and brilliant metaphors and use of symbolic visuals, she is now... Read more
Published 3 months ago by Alfred Santoli

1.0 out of 5 stars Not what I had hoped.
I used to LOVE Ani, but she lost me at to the teeth. Her voice really began to become injured, and the music became far too overproduced. Read more
Published 6 months ago by Jennifer E. Gerbi

2.0 out of 5 stars Somewhat Alienating
I've been a hard core Ani fan for over a decade and have all her albums (except this one which after listening to it a couple of time I've decided I will not buy). Read more
Published 7 months ago by It's me

5.0 out of 5 stars Red is the color of love!
Ani Difranco has a lot to sing about. Our generational troubadour is seeing the prime of her life as she basks in the glow of motherhood. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Andrew Hicks

4.0 out of 5 stars My First Ani DeFranco Album
I really enjoyed the songs on this album. I have heard great things about Ani DeFranco and decided to finally check her out. This is a good introduction. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Lynn Ellingwood

4.0 out of 5 stars took a long time to like, probably her "worst", but I like it now..
I gotta say I was extremely unhappy with this record the first few time it played in my stereo. I've been loving her music for a long time now, and in her studio records and in... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Avraham Yacov

4.0 out of 5 stars Fresh & light, but still Ani
My favorite Ani record is Dilate, and I like that dark f***you aspect of her music. Yet I'm really growing to like the lighter, fresher more positive feel of Red Letter Year... Read more
Published 11 months ago by T. J. Fleck

5.0 out of 5 stars Deserves a Red Letter "A"! lol
I love this album. The past few Ani albums have been good, but not great in my book. This one I think is spectacular. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Rose Schwartz

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