Review: Aimee Mann offers sweet music, bitter lyrics, disappointing listening

May 11, 2000
Web posted at: 4:14 p.m. EST (2014 GMT)

By David John Farinella
Special to CNN Interactive

Mann lays bare her emotional scars in "Bachelor No. 2"

Aimee Mann
"Bachelor No. 2"
(SuperEgo Records)

(CNN) -- Listening to an Aimee Mann song is aural voyeurism -- all bright and shiny on the outside, dark and disappointing on the inside. Or at least that's how it sounds in "Bachelor No. 2," Mann's latest album.

Just listen to "You Do," a sweet song with bitter lyrics: "The sex you're trading up for/what you hope is love/is just another thing that/he'll be careless of/but though there are caveats galore/you've only got to love him more -- /and you do."

If you think that sounds depressing, get used to it. There are 12 more songs like it on her album.

In "Bachelor No. 2," Mann pulls listeners repeatedly through perfectly crafted pop songs that are biographical as well. Whether the topic is battling with record companies in "How Am I Different" or personal disappointment in "Susan," Mann lays out her emotional scars.

Nothing optimistic here

To be sure, it's not all comfortable listening. Where any other artist would attempt to balance an album full of bitter material with something at least slightly optimistic, Mann does not: She explicitly details how she's been duped and disappointed.

Does that attitude ruin "Bachelor No. 2" as a whole? No, but there's not a redemptive moment to be found in the album, either.

Perhaps that's the point. Few modern artists who have been treated like Aimee Mann -- and even fewer who have been vocal in their disdain for the system. Mann, who broke out in 1985 with the group 'Til Tuesday, went solo after the band's demise, and then took her lumps as she found herself between labels more often than she was on them.

Yet, in that time Mann still managed to churn out some stunning pop numbers. The 1993 album "Whatever" and "I'm With Stupid" in 1995 are proof that she's a pop mastermind.

	AUDIO
"The Fall of the World's Own Optimist" 224K MP3 or 352K WAV sound "Satellite" 288K MP3 or 416K WAV sound "You Do" 224K MP3 or 352K WAV sound (Sound courtesy SuperEgo Records)

A disappointing album

Mann's stature increased even more last year when her work on the film "Magnolia" was nominated for an Oscar and a Golden Globe. Filmmaker Paul Thomas Anderson has said Mann's songs brought the movie to life.

So it's disappointing "Bachelor No. 2" doesn't resonate with the same emotional punch of some of Mann's earlier work. Though her voice has never sounded better or her craft more polished, Mann's bitterness drowns the album's promise.

Yes, there are gorgeous songs here. Yes, "Satellite," "Deathly" and "The Fall of the World's Own Optimist" are ably composed and expertly performed. Still, her gentle melodic soprano can't overcome the vitriol of her lyrics.

Happily, Mann has never been known to be a wallflower or a polite dilettante. The recording world would be a better place if more artists spoke their minds with the passion Mann has evoked. Yet she's spoken a bit too bitterly this time.

Perhaps next time she'll pick a new bachelor, and we'll hear how good things have become.

Critically acclaimed, commercially snubbed, Michael Penn tries again
April 25, 2000
The list of Golden Globe nominees
December 20, 1999
Review: 'Magnolia' -- in Robert Altman we trust
December 16, 1999

Official Aimee Mann site

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