Night Bugs

With Night Bugs, Slean reveals a fuller, more-realized sound than on her previous indie releases. To capitalize on this expanded sound, she re-recorded three of her earlier tracks, disc openers "Eliot" and "Weight," and "My Invitation" to add with her slew of new songs. Producer Hawksley Workman (whose virtues I've extolled on numerous occasions) provides a perfect collaborator for Slean as his own over-the-top brand of Tin Pan Alley and musical revue stylings merge well with her sentiment and flavorings. "Eliot" opens with a simple piano melody introducing the listener to Slean's dramatic cabaret and piano bar stylings before building to a crescendo with its chorus. "Weight" explodes with a memorable piano line filtered to sound a bit like a drum beat and her singing, "What did I give to you / What did you give to me / A nothing-trail of silences that warp in the rain." The masterpiece for me on Night Bugs however is "Duncan," perhaps her most theatrically inclined song. "Duncan" is an epic of a song comparing love and war as the timpani and xylophone built to its chorus of "Oh you fool you fool / Don't give in to fate / If this is all we've got to fight for / Rage, my darling rage! / Duncan good for you / Sad but on your way / Well the army never turned his crank / But love sure made him brave." and finally concluding with the verse, "This is holy war! / We must fight and fight again / And go a thousand times for the sake of love / But never once in vain." Maybe I'm a sucker but the notion of love being the only thing to fight for and if you're gonna go down then go down raging, gets me every time. Despite her inclination towards theatrics, Slean is not afraid to keep it simple as she does on "St. Francis" and "My Invitation." Similarly, with her favoritism towards melancholy she knows how to keep things Waits-ical on "Drastic Measures," "Book Smart, Street Stupid," and "Me, I'm A Thief." The instrumental string-based "Dark Ones" is equally tonal in its mood and cinematic grandeur contrasting the higher register of a violin with the lower parts of a cello and plucked double bass. The jaunty "Sweet Ones" and "Bank Accounts," detailing the lives of Toronto's nouveau-riche, are two tracks that get me pounding on my piano everytime I hear them. (She's even wry enough to sell "Sweet Ones" undies as part of her merch. "Come over to the sweet ones baby ... If I could have just one piece of that I'd be sold.") Slean wraps her husky alto dripping with colorful sorrow around her poetic lyrics conjuring images of streetlamp-lit trees in midnight parks making Night Bugs an instant classic for fans of literate singer/songwriter piano-based confessional art-pop.

I'd give a rating for each song on Night Bugs, but they'd all be 5 out of 5. Instead, I'll list my favourite songs (in order they appear):

Eliot (a light, catchy, jazzy and mellow tune)
Weight (an up-tempo song, most Radiohead like on the album)
Duncan (One of the best melodies on the album, very catchy)
St. Frances (extremely somber and emotional tune, extremely beautiful)
Drastic Measures (One of my favourites, will get your toes tapping)
Book Smart, Street Stupid (great study song for anyone in University)
Dark Room (a very pretty instrument composition, good intro to the next song)
Sweet Ones (the best song I've heard in quite a while, definitely the catchiest tune on the record)
Me, I'm a Thief (a heavy and dark song that portrays Sarah's amazing ability to establish an atmosphere)
My Invitation (the "lullaby" of the record; a song that has been wonderfully crafted).
Bank Accounts (the closest you'll hear Sarah being overtly political, however, one of the best upbeat songs on the album).

I've just realized that I've reviewed every song on the album, but really, it's hard to pick favourite with an album with this. It's a shame some other Canadian female artists are garnering the attention that they do while the true musical talent Canada has to offer still doesn't have the broad audience she deserves. Her next album (which if it's anything like Night Bugs) should propel her to major stardom. I strong encourage you to make this the next album you buy!!! Thank you