September / October 2002 - Crime

CD Review

Happy Rhodes
Many Worlds Are Born Tonight
Gold Circle Entertainment, Inc. � 1998

Review by Meisha Rosenberg

Listening to Happy Rhodes' tenth album, Many Worlds Are Born Tonight, is like listening to your own inner goddess who also happens to know how to hack into a computer. Rhodes� four-octave voice conjures, mourns and laughs with the otherworldly wonderings of an old soul. Capable of sounding robotically discordant and melancholy or full of child-like wonder (as in the dreamy �Ra is a Busy God�), Rhodes' voice often sounds like a more melodic Laurie Anderson or a less amplified, less poppy Annie Lennox. Her deft vocal maneuvering is awe-inspiring. �The Chariot,� for instance, pairs a little-girl chorus with a deep, arresting low-range melody that doesn�t sound like it could emerge from the same person. One new listener even mistakenly identified her low register as a man's.

Her intensely personal lyrics are sometimes ironic - �There's been a slight oversight/An honest mistake/You see four short years does not a lifetime make� (�Roy (Back from the Offworld)�) - but they are tempered by her metaphysical sensibility. Distinctive electronic/experimental sounds, complete with sampling, layering, and quirky pops and clicks, augment her words. Her tools are diverse (�Winter� credits �Barney Rubble Drums, Nails of Goat, and �Oh� by Jerry Marotta), but her songs never lose sight of humble melody, returning to it as one might return to the ancient goddesses, with operatic crescendos and occasional ululation. �100 Years,� with its warpy sounds, obsessive chorus and ominous downbeat, would be fitting as a soundtrack to the next Matrix-esque movie.

Like much of her music, it seeks the spiritual in our technological world through stunning soprano and alto breakaways: �Who does the download/ when my work is finished here?� No wonder the work of this upstate New York vocal priestess transcends genre (�I'm every label's worst nightmare�). She creates organically: �When recording an album, I do whatever my life is dictating at that moment.� Many Worlds encourages its audience to �Listen to what moves you.� We would be wise to take heed. NG




back to top


Archives | Distribution | Order Copy | News | About NG! | Site Map | Webmaster

ISSN 1536-9897 Copyright 2002 by Nervy Girl!, LLC. All rights reserved. Reproduction without permission is prohibited.