A fifty something, tricycle riding , classically trained harpist,former church organist, transsexual performance artist seems an unlikely icon no? baby Dee's amazing life has led up to an incredible new record for Drag City called SAFE INSIDE THE DAY. An amazing and unlikely mix of sparse piano ballads, tin pan alley blues, vaudevillian ditties, classical folk work Safe Inside The Day take listeners on a journey through the last 500 years of musical evolution all throw the unique perspective of this American original. While her voice is at times challenging, a work this self assured and complex is worth settling into. Stand out track The Early King, a reworking of Germanic folk tale is terrifying and brilliantly entertaining while the Teeth Are The Only Bones That Show builds from a stark arrangement to a rousing barnstormer. This album, like Nick Cave's seminal MURDER BALLADS will of course have its detractors, some without so much as giving the album a careful listen and seeing it for it's merits. It defies genre classification and jumps from style to style at will. It's so singular and brilliant in that it defies the listeners very expectation of what pop music even IS any longer these days.
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