In House #1738: Joanna Newsom in Salt Lake City This Weekend

Easily one of the most anticipated indie releases of the year, Joanna Newsom's Ys will be released by Drag City on November 14th, over two months after it was inadvertently leaked by a rather well-known music website. Ys finds the diminuative harpist-singer-songwriter expanding on the palette exhibited on her debut, The Milk-Eyed Mender, and in more ways than one. The full-length release consists of only five compositions, but clocks in at just under an hour, meaning the songs are more along the lines of mini-suites than pop songs. With the help of a trio of superstar producers and arrangers-- Steve Albini, Van Dyke Parks, and Jim O'Rourke-- Newsom also expands her range of sound with fleshed out string arrangements and odds & ends sonic peripherals, all still of course surrounding the oddball centerpieces that are her harp and Bjork-in-Appalachia vocals. Newsom may not be for everyone (indeed, she appears to be downright divisive), and she may have only accentuated that by releasing an album of pieces that are anything but light listening. But Ys is a seeper, an album that creeps deeper upon repeated listening, and a November release if there ever was one. It's challenging listening that ultimately rewards amply. Newsom hits The Depot in Salt Lake City this Saturday night.

Joanna Newsom

In House #1738.
Airdate: 11/02/06
Focus: New material from Joanna Newsom, playing Salt Lake City this weekend, plus new music from The Decemberists, The Awkward Stage, and the recent tribute album, Do It Again: A Tribute to Pet Sounds.

BONUS MP3s from today's show-
Joanna Newsom, from Ys: "Cosmia" (MP3)

Ladybug Transistor, from Ladybug Transistor:
"Splendor In the Grass" (MP3) (Jackie DeShannon cover)


PLAYLIST

In House PODCAST #201