By: Paul Lessane

The genre of singer/songwriter, over the past ten years anyway, has been jumping up and down on the diving board of commercial whoredom to the pool of retail ignorance below it that the YMCA-like music industry is famous for. While record executives clamor to duplicate the undercurrents of minority successes like Tori Amos and Fiona Apple, the genre becomes a first-quarter surfboard riding the waves of fiscal discipline. Quality dies and so do our ears, all in favor of a taste from a paradigm of what we used to think was the quote unquote.

Unfortunately, it’s the case with every sub-phylum in the industry we call genres. We get the freaks — wanton statue-esques that hustle and flow from the pipes of record labels. So righteous and infallible in their right under the circumstances of “the genre,” they can do no wrong, these singer/songwriters.

No fear, though, no fear. After all, if money didn’t exist, would there even be record labels? Take a wild guess — go on, i dare you. No? Well. Suppose we could all just count our lucky stars. So I guess then it would just be score one more for capitalism then — yay. 

That’s not to say every apple falls from the same tree. Take Washington singer/songwriter Eleanor Murray. For one year, she endeavored to create the acoustic menagerie of her debut album, For Cedar.

The result is a windy breath of fresh air that climbs the walls of your attention span and forces your every emotion to agree just long enough to lose yourself in the picture it paints. 

Most of the songs on For Cedar are your atypical muses from the singer/songwriter school of hard knocks. Love, regret, pain, and emptiness — all of the ingredients for a melancholic recipe of existential complaining. It’s easy to get caught up in the sound of Eleanor Murray’s voice. It’s a whispy pour of fluttering lament that sounds as if you’re listening to your kid sister tell you why your parents cheated on one another. The finest moments on For Cedars are technically mediocre at best, but the presentation of the pieces are so brilliant that it just doesn’t matter. The most uplifting track on the album is “Joseph’s Song,” an upbeat string-laden assurance that talks of the promise of better scenery. On “Healing,” a plaintive outcry for the solace of her mother’s wisdom, Murray explores the emotional roller coasters of not knowing how or when to say “when.” All the songs have their merits, but none go as far as “The Last Meal,” a jangly tell tale about recovering from an impossible heartbreak.

For a first outing, Eleanor Murray has crafted a 46-minute space worthy of your hearing, but dont take my word for it. Just turn on the radio.

Popularity: 2% [?]