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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Devotchka....A not so mad but faithful review, 19 April 2008
Devotchka ( The name is taken from the film "A Clockwork Orange" and translates as little girl) were responsible for my favourite album of last year -except that it was originally released in 2004. How It Ends is a giddy mixture of imprecise Eastern tones performed with tangible relish and gusto. The band have gained more of a following through their appearance on the soundtrack of underwhelming indie film "Little Miss Sunshine" yet are still no where near as huge as they should be.
Devotchka are a quartet from Denver Colorado and offer their lucky listeners
an intoxicating concoction of Romany, Greek, Slavic and South American-influenced sounds stirred by the distractingly mordant voice of front man Nick Urata and mysteriously spiced with an esoteric array of instruments that includes trumpet, bouzouki, accordion, vibraphone, glockenspiel, and the other-worldly-sounding Theremin as well as more traditional stuff like guitar, organ and piano. Like a far more expansive Calexico, and one who may have some vague idea to enjoy themselves the band provide a bewitching array of songs of love , faith ,atonement and stuff I'm probably too dim to understand.
Complete with some lovely landscape photo's taken by the band , A Mad And Faithful Telling has ten songs from the mariachi trumpet sway of "Along The Way" , the hip thrusting tango of Blessing In Disguise" to the completely schizophrenic opener "Basso Profundo" which mixes opera or something like it with whirly gig pop and flamenco balladry or something like it. Best of all it has the single "Transliterator" which begins with solicitous tinkling notes but becomes increasingly strident and dramatic with Urata declaring "You better mean what you say/ Why don't you say what you mean/ I never get anywhere, I get the space in-between ".
There are a couple of throwaway instrumentals "Strizzalo" and "Comrade Z " and the ballad "Undone" is all forlorn affectation without anything memorable to back it up but thankfully a far more powerful ballad closes the album ."New World" has a swoon some lugubrious melody , a tangible sense of anticipation with eerie vocal backing and vivid chopping strings before the cinematic Nyman like strings of the last third. It sums up nicely in five minutes why this band are so special.
Listen.... A Mad And Faithful Telling isn't as good as How It Ends, In all honesty it was never likely to be . For all that Devotchka still sound like one of the greatest bands in this misbegotten world to me.
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8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Solo tù y yo, that's what I want the most, 25 Mar 2008
DeVotchKa has always done the gypsyish-rock sound, and in their last album "How It Ends" they added a poignant string section.
Well, they do one better in "A Mad and Faithful Telling," a gloriously energetic, sepia-toned ride that juggles rock, pop, Eastern European dance, and a tinge of that heartbreaking orchestral music. As it makes you laugh and breaks your heart, DeVotchKa turns out their most balanced, polished album to date.
"I'm concentrated on the wrong side of the law/From the creator/of this beautiful strip mall/A decimator of the cinder block world," Nick Urata wails over tight, nimble violins and a bouncy, raucous tune.
But it has its sadder moments -- a stretch of lamenting cries and bolero-flavoured music, followed by a greed-inspired reflection ("All the world is for the taking/Just forget the hearts you're breaking/Is this love that you are making/or is it a deal?"). Then they break out the mariachi horns for the stately, swirling "Along The Way," and the xylophone and sweeping violins for the bittersweetly exquisite "Clockwork Witness."
Those songs set the tone for the rest of the album -- rough-edged gypsy-rockers, energetic fiddle dance, haunting Romany ballads, confusingly swirly rockers, and Spanish-flavoured laments. There's even a pure rock tune near the end, a slightly schizoid little song ("Beautifully mutilated, insanely antiquated/I will admit I almost always underestimate it...")
Even if their music wasn't so much fun, DeVotchKa would still stick out a mile -- they used to play burlesque clubs, their name is a Russsian word for "woman," and the members' musical backgrounds... well, it would take too much time to recount. Suffice to say, DeVotchKa's latest does a brilliant balancing act with ballads, rockers and dancey traditional music, sometimes all in one song.
In fact, if there's a flaw with this album, it's that the best songs are so brilliant that the others seem merely good by comparison. As a whole, "A Mad And Faithful Telling" sounds like a journey through Europe with a bunch of rock'n'roll gypsies, looking at the sights and soaking up the old cultures.
Instead of sticking to one style, they juggle and intertwine three or four. We get some guitar (both punky and Spanishy acoustic), solid drums and some piano as the core -- and around that, they spin a cloud of shifting trumpets, accordion, bouzouki, tinkly theremin and upright bass. And there's a web of violins -- nimble, scraping like fiddles, or smoothly sweeping in an epic arc.
Urata has one of those great warbling voices often found in Eastern European music. And the lyrics match his yowly vocals -- laments about greed, confusing love songs, and even a prayer where he announces that "you know I never hurt no one/What I have stolen won't be missed" and warns that "If you must take me/I can not go peacefully/I left someone waiting for me..."
"A Mad and Faithful Telling" is mad, but remains faithful to no style. Ballads, mariachi-flavoured dance and gypsy rock'n'roll are all woven into this amazing little album... and it ends up being their best.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Moderately disappointing, 26 Mar 2008
The last two Devotchka albums were significantly better than this one. The last Devotchka album, How It Ends, is one of the albums of the decade. However this album is definitely a step backward, and is regulation stuff for Devotchka. They have not progressed here at all. The first track is annoying in every respect. The album becomes more pleasing after that, but the singing isn't quite as good by Nick Urata, and the inspiration is mostly lacking. There are certainly good moments here, but only with the marvellous closing track do they reach the majestic heights of How It Ends. For those genuinely interested, buy the two albums that preceded this one first. This isn't a bad album by any means, but Devotchka are capable of much more. The sad songs aren't affecting enough, and the upbeat numbers lack the dynamism of previous recordings. I held incredibly high hopes for this album, so maybe I'm being overly critical, but Devotchka have set high standards for themselves, and they don't really reach them here. Hardcore fans will appreciate what I'm saying.
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