Labels: Fat Badger Recordings
Review by: Robert Clay
The very mention of the words “female singer-songwriter” conjures images of frail looking girls, feathering broken guitar chords while musing on today’s trivialities. When the songs over, they shift the capo on their acoustic guitar and do it again. You know the kind, there’s no shortage of them and they aren’t going anywhere. Don’t get me wrong, they’re alright. But that’s just the problem, they’re alright.
So, knowing nothing about her it was with some apprehension I placed the music of Frivolous Laura into my brand new second hand stereo. I need not have worried, from the opening chords of A Lullaby I was in. A slithering, deceptively simple arpeggio gently pushes on this ode to sleeplessness complete with troublesome goblins and hungry wolves. Yes, I said hungry wolves.
There’s something about Little Baby which despite its minimalist approach (or because of it) leaves me ever so slightly perturbed. It sounds very much like the calm after the storm. A voyeuristic glimpse into a situation where everything that can go wrong, has gone wrong. Just what that is I don’t know and I’d like to keep it that way.
The three song cycle which closes A Lullaby does so in a bold manner. A sombre introduction lures us in breaking unexpectedly into joyous Waitseque romp The Worker’s Song before finally allowing us to catch our breath with meditative closing piece, The Workers Lament. All in all Frivolous Laura delivers a remarkably confident debut. The EP covers much stylistic ground, seemingly without trepidation yet still creates a sound all of its own. If there’s such a thing as a sprawling EP, this is it. Highly recommended.