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┌────────┐
────┤ Info ├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
└────────┘
Artist | Eleni Mandell
Title | Dark Lights Up
Genre | Folk/Rock Format | Album
Source | CDDA Time | 39:26
Label | Yep Roc Records Store | 2015
Catalog | YEP-2444 Rip | 2015
Bitrate | 222 kbps Size | 65.80 MB
Freq | 44.1 kHz Encoder | Lame 3.98.4
┌────────┐
────┤ Tracks ├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
└────────┘
01. I'm Old Fashioned 2:56
02. What Love Can Do 2:30
03. Someone To Love Like You 3:32
04. Cold Snap 3:02
05. China Garden Buffet 5:24
06. Town Called Heartache 2:08
07. Old Lady 4:13
08. Magic Pair Of Shoes 3:18
09. If You Wanna Get Kissed 2:08
10. Baby, Don't Call 3:35
11. Butter Blonde And Chocolate Brown 3:43
12. Do It Again 2:57
┌────────┐
────┤ Notes ├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
└────────┘
Singing and writing in a style that fuses vintage barroom cool with a
here-and-now intelligence and faintly ironic wit, Los Angeles hipster Eleni
Mandell initiated her recording career with arty-cool albums packed with
her smoky, noir-ish sketches. Mandell, who was a huge fan of L.A. punkers X
and beatnik revivalist Tom Waits in her teens, was raised in the Sherman
Oaks region of the San Fernando Valley, and began performing out during her
years as a student at Berkeley. Soon after, she fell under the mentorship
of Chuck E. Weiss, the Tom Waits associate who became the subject of Rickie
Lee Jones' "Chuck E's in Love".
Eleni Mandell has been waiting her whole career to open an album with a
song like "I'm Old Fashioned," in which the decidedly retro vocalist and
songwriter warbles a litany of things she likes in spite of their perceived
obsolescence, such as newspapers, telephones that plug into the wall, vinyl
record albums, letters that require stamps, going to the bank, and
percolators ('a little burnt, but it'll do'). While there was a sharp,
smoky undercurrent to Mandell's early albums, on her tenth long-player,
2015's "Dark Lights Up", Mandell sounds smart, sly, sweet, and sincere,
imagining a world where gals still croon about Mr. Right (when he comes
around), a really good kiss (when they happen), and a good strong cocktail
(when A and B can't be relied upon).
Despite her clear fondness for other decades, Mandell still seems like a
realist who can see past her rose-colored glasses on "Dark Lights Up",
welcoming the prospect of aging while exposing a touch of reticence ('Old
Lady'), using that perfect pair of shoes as a metaphor for all she wants
out of life ('Magic Pair of Shoes'), and dealing with the realities of
dating ('If You Wanna Get Kissed'). And "Butter Blonde and Chocolate Brown"
is a beautifully observed portrait of two opposites attracting one another.
Mandell's vocals are breezy on "Dark Lights Up", but with enough resonance
in her phrasing to give her stories and characters a welcome amount of
detail, and her backing band (especially pianist Nate Walcott and bassist
Ryan Feves) gets the late-in-the-evening ambience of these songs just
right.
On "Dark Lights Up", Eleni Mandell manages to fuse the best qualities of a
romantic and a realist, and she sets their tales to music that's engaging
and never too kitschy for its own good; if Mandell has turned into a
smoothie with the passage of time, this music confirms it's a style that
suits her very well indeed.
┌────────┐
────┤ Group ├─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
└────────┘