Martha Wainwright - I Know You're Married But I've Got Feelings Too

by Eddie Robson

Two wrongs don't make a Wainwright

"It’s clear that Wainwright is either possessed of incredibly good judgement or she works very hard at steering her music away from the middle of the road whilst she ploughs that tricky furrow of acoustic-led melodic rock."

Ever since Alanis Morrissette showed that bitter songs raging at her ex-boyfriends sold way better than chirpy dance-pop, moany female singer-songwriters have been one of the staples of the western music industry. Many of them are, frankly, rather dull, so hurrah for Martha Wainwright who has returned to destroy the lot of them by doing much the same thing only brilliant.

From the title, it’s immediately obvious that she’s doing the relationship angst thing with a good dose of wry, self-aware humour; pleasingly, the phrase appears in the first track ‘Bleeding All Over You’, delivered with that appealing lazy drawl which, as we have seen, is capable of rendering even a Snow Patrol song interesting. Fans of her ‘angst’ songwriting will delight at the singalong chorus of ‘You Cheated Me’ and the light-touch bleakness of ‘So Many Friends’. On these tracks, it’s clear that Wainwright is either possessed of incredibly good judgement or she works very hard at steering her music away from the middle of the road whilst she ploughs that tricky furrow of acoustic-led melodic rock.

However, she seems aware that there’s a risk of going around in ever decreasing circles if she keeps doing that same thing over and over, so she breaks out in ways that weren’t evident on her 2005 debut. Tracks like ‘Tower’ seem equally influenced by her brother Rufus’s ambitious genre-hopping and 1960s psychedelia: there’s less of a traditional song structure, lots of hard-to-identify sounds. ‘Hearts Club Band’ is a close cousin of Rufus’s ‘Slideshow’ off his last album, but is actually slightly better. There are some soft, subtle pieces like ‘Niger River’, which don’t hit you over the head with the melody. And there’s a really good cover of Pink Floyd’s ‘See Emily Play’, all of which go into creating a richer and more diverse record than her last one.

On the off-chance you’re reading this and eagerly awaiting the new Dido album, do yourself a favour and buy Martha’s instead. You may find that by the time Dido’s gets here, you no longer give a toss.
Anna said on May 9th 2008 [report abuse]

I can't wait to hear this! Martha is an amazing artist.

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