Ray Lamontagne preview

Ray Lamontagne
Vic Theatre, Chicago
November 28 and 29, 2006

Maine-native/singer-songwriter (how many people can claim that?) Ray Lamontagne and his second album seem to have taken to mind all the reviews from his first, 2003’s Trouble (RCA). Instead of making like an R&B singer and amping up the vibrato, however, he turns inward.

Lamontagne’s voice — smoky, husky — espouses all the characteristics normally attributed to large women. It’s not as spell-bindingly androgynous as Nina Simone, blustery as Janis Joplin, or Tracy Chapman as Tracy Chapman’s, but the kind of thing that when shown off tends to lose its allure. Once you got past the “is this really a dude?” novelty of Trouble, the album was forced to sustain itself on the songwriting, which was affable at best, but mostly regular.

Till The Sun Turns Black is a different beast — mildly. Like the black album cover with only a flashlight as a graphic, it’s a shrouded, candlelit affair, a faux-nightclub jazz/mysterioso job coating Lamontagne’s othergenderly pipes in strings, Wurlitzer. and Fender Rhodes. He’s almost reluctant to sing above a murmur, either an attempt to sexualize the album or draw focus to its more textured nuances.

The question then becomes whether the delicate touches are worth their inclusion, and despite fine attempts at authenticity by Lamontagne and producer Ethan Johns, they fail to evoke something approaching the startling beauty of Antony & The Johnsons’ I Am A Bird Now or the brandy-snifter waft Nick Cave has finally perfected. “Empty” and the title track would actually be more well-suited as a vocal showcase, as the beleaguered string arrangements are typical in the blandest sense, and ultimately cancel out Lamontagne’s work. The singer surrounds himself with open space on Sun, but ultimately fills it with fluff. It’s a pretentious album whose last song doesn’t have a coda, it is a coda.

Midway through he hits “You Can Bring Me Flowers,” which succeeds in bringing our unwilling hero out of his corner and under the spotlight. Where were ya, babe? Almost didn’t notice you sitting there.

— Steve Forstneger

Category: Stage Buzz, Weekly