| For a few tracks there, it seems like
she's back: the raging, clothing-rending, acoustic guitar-pounding Melissa Etheridge who
first won the hearts of a cult and some critics in 1988 with her gut-wrenchingly honest,
sparsely intimate debut. Since her last release Etheridge has ended her relationship with
filmmaker Julie Cypher, with whom she had made a home, a family and a high profile sort of
living advertisement for the possibility of prosperous, unthreatening domestic gay
marriage.
The breakup is, of course, unhappy news for
Melissa and gays who saw Etheridge as a role model. But it's happy news (one has to admit,
if blushingly) for those of us who found the anguished lyrics on her last three sweepingly
hyper-polished pop albums unconvincing.
While some of her platinum-selling Adult
Contemporary hits in the mid-to-late 1990s actually flat out admitted to happiness
("Come to My Window"), most attempted a shallow version of the precious pain
that won over her early fans. The New Melissa, the million-selling Melissa, was content to
play-act angst in upbeat radio-friendly nuggets designed to keep soccer moms cheerily
singing lines like "I'm the only one to walk across the fire for you" along with
the car radio after dropping off the tots at the rec center. Sure, Melissa was still
belting out songs with the power of a B1B Lancer, but instead of feeling the pain like a
method actress, she pretty much just let us know she was having fun hollering.
Over the last year or so, though, she's stored
up enough genuine black feelings to stoke a few tracks with some genuine good
old-fashioned grief. The first three songs are even produced with a kind of evocative
folkie intimacy she hasn't evinced since her sophomore record, Brave and Crazy,
which was a bloody good set of acoustic rock-n-roll angst that somehow landed itself in
all the budget bins within a few short months of its release in 1989. "Prison"
loops acoustic fingerpicking and moaning harmonica, recalling the simple honesty of
"Angels" or "You Can Sleep While I Drive." "Walking on
Water" follows with a surprisingly effective jazz flute, some unobtrusive electronic
rhythm and an angry guitar strum reminiscent of the sparse fury of her classic eponymous
debut album.
But, only four tracks in, Melissa reminds us
she's a big rock star. "Down to One" is syrupy, radiofriendly and predictable.
From there on, things are pretty uneven, with a few moments of razor-sharp writing and
more moments of saccharine production indistinguishable from the sounds of any other of a
dozen adult contemporary radio stars. Not much there for fans of the Old Melissa. Plenty
for the legions who love the New Melissa.
For four minutes near the end of the album,
however, the New Melissa redeems herself with a powerfully produced acoustic-dance-pop
anthem that she never would have recorded when she was still an unhappy closeted folkie in
the late-1980s (although stylistically it does recall the first dance song she ever
recorded, back in 1992--the chorus of which, spookily enough, was "wake me up in the
year 2001"). "The Different" aims razor-sharp barbs at the intolerant likes
of the "Right Reverend" Fred Phelps and the prurient purveyors of tabloid
reports of her breakup ("don't worry about the kids, the kids are alright," she
snaps). Then it's back to the predictable stuff for the album's conclusion, with a big
dramatic ode to the healing process ("Heal Me"). Those of us who wish good
things for Etheridge can take heart: she's in good spirits again. Unfortunately, she
communicates her happiness exclusively in trite terms.Yes, she's lived the pain of a
brutal breakup in the glare of the national media spotlight. But, the final track reminds
us, she's not so bruised that she's willing to toss the safety of populist production and
forfeit the big bucks her pop singles earn. After all, she has to pay off the 1967 Camaro
convertable she bought to help boost her mood after the divorce.
After finishing Skin, Etheridge decided
to try to rediscover her identity sans life partner by taking to the road solo on a
bandless tour that took her through Chicago in August. Maybe the time alone will inspire
the Next Melissa to combine the happiness of the New Melissa with the intimate risk-taking
of the Old Melissa.
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