Customer Reviews

La vache qui pleure

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

How exciting it was to discover a new record by Kate and Anna. I play this cd over and over again in my car, and especially the first song. The instruments begin one at a time, eventually creating a multilayered richness. Having studied Germanic languages, my French is limited. Okay, so I bought a new French dictionary and figured out the first song. This leads me to wonder why the inner sleeve doesn't have English translations. We can't all be bilingual, now, can we, n'est-pas?? (Sunflowers does have an Anglo version at the end, though).
Also, I really don't like the interruption to all the great music with that horrible poem recited by what's-his-name. I just skip it and return to the blissful voices of our favorite sisters. Nevertheless, this is still a five star cd.

This rare last decade album from the McGarrigles lends a subtly different quality than their early, more famous work. Less energetic, but informed by their greater life experience. "Rose Blanche," a more intense version than their earlier recording, is worth the price of the album. So glad that Anna is keeping the candle burning through her commitment to empty the vault of their previously unreleased work.

Like Tom and Gabriel, I have been a fan for a long time, since seeing them appear on "Saturday Night Live" c.1975 and wondering who they were and if they had recordings out, etc. A few years ago they appeared in San Francisco and my then-girlfriend-now-wife and I still weep and sigh over that wonderful evening; Kate McGarrigle had washed her hair prior to the concert; these are the things you learn from a live performance. "La Vache Qui Pleure" is, spectacularly and wonderfully, "more of the same" which means you need to buy a copy for youself and a few dozen to pass out as gifts. But $30.00 for a single CD is musical blackmail, especially since, as Mr. Good suggests, it would cost less if ordered from Amazon.ca (Canada, not California). It is: there, it sells for $16.99 Canadian dollars. In American terms, that's about $12.25. Amazon.ca will also toss in the McGarrigles first "French" album - "Entre la Jeunesse et la Tendresse" - and the two CDs will only cost the US equivalent of $25.20. Even after postage is added, this is the route I'm going.

"Doctor," I said, "I don't understand my dreams." "Why do you believe that is?" he said. "Because," I said, "I have begun dreaming in French." "Oh?" he said. "Yes," I said, "and I don't understand French."

Gabriel Nilsson's review says it beautifully: another wonderful recording by those elusive sisters from the frozen north, but they seem to be deliberately making it hard for us.

Their website has been "under construction" since the 1920's, and to even know of the existence of this CD you'd have to be a diehard fan (like Gabriel and myself) dutifully typing "McGarrigle" in the search box every now and then, in the forlorn hope of something having happened.

But the music is wonderful. And yes, their voices are still remarkably good as years roll by - Anna, in fact, seems to be singing better than she ever did. The production is just perfect (and sometimes unusually daring in its textures and tonal shifts) and the playing is, as usual, peerless.

This will sell about twelve copies worldwide in its first year: if you're prepared to pay the extortionate price here, you could be buyer number thirteen. Actually, I think you'll get it cheaper if you buy from Amazon Canada.

The long anticipated lifesign from the McGarrigle sisters is a winner from start to end. This is pure quality! Their angellike vocies blend perfectly, and the songs are as timeless as the ones on their debut masterpiece "Kate & Anna McGarrigle" in the seventies. The music is still best described as modern folkmusic, with a twist of country and americana. Philippe Tartieff is co-composer as ususal, a perfect partner to the McGarrigle sisters unique voices.
This time they sing in french except for on one tune. Lyrics are included so if you don't speak french fluently (I don't) you can do some homework. It's worth the effort! I hope the next McGarrigle-album wont take long. And that their homepage will be finished - it's been standing still for ages!