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Rating: I don't remember exactly how I got to know Emily Haines, pianist and songwriter born in 1974; what I know for sure is that it was entirely by chance.
I was probably looking for something similar to Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, or Lisa Germano on sites like Lastfm, when a whole new world suddenly opened up for me.
Granted, it's a rather limited world, given the small number of solo CDs she's conceived, but one in which I've been immersed for years and from which I don't want, nor am able, to resurface.
To tell you about her, I can say she is Canadian by adoption, grew up breathing art thanks to her poet father, Paul, and started dedicating herself to music early on by first listening and then writing.
She formed a group (of which she is the Leader), which she still indicates as her musical priority, the Metric, an indie-funky-rock-electronic band with which she recorded five albums (the last one is from 2012), simultaneously collaborating with the Broken Social Scene but above all publishing solo - under the pseudonym "Emily & The Soft Skeleton" - two CDs and an EP of ballads where her soprano vocal skills and her piano aptitude decidedly stand out. The first CD, self-produced in a limited edition (2,000 copies) is almost impossible to find, while the one I’m writing about now and nourished on for years, Knives Don't Have Your Back (2006) is easily orderable online, for those like me who feel the need to have it in original.
How can I summarize this splendid work?
I’ve been thinking for a long time of reproposing it on Debaser as the presence of a review from 2006 with only five comments (mine included) is scandalous for a similar CD, but I have never really found the right words and perhaps I won't even have them now.
In this controversial virtual living room of ours, one cannot help but talk again about a CD of such delicacy, class, and beauty, as well as of such intensity, capable of provoking profound emotions and real enrapture.
There’s nothing amiss in the arrangement, not a comma on the staff, not a smudge in Emily's intense voice, a voice seemingly thin, but capable of carving tunnels in the listener's stomach.
With shadowy melancholy and joyful surprise.
Everything becomes rarefied, the passing of time ceases to exist as conceived and constructed by our ancestors, there is no place or matter that remains as we know it, one ascends to a higher level, enveloped in a warm cocoon where words, the sounds and images evoked completely remove us from reality, to undertake a lysergic journey that starts with hearing and permeates all senses.
As if it wasn't enough, the tracklist is perfect and every song matches the previous one.
I believe I could listen to the hypnotic piano (and see the "film" in my head) of Crowd Surf Off a Cliff for hours and hours without ever getting tired, without even realizing it.
“Everywhere and every way I see you with me..…
The life that you thought through is gone
Can't want out, the ending outlasting the mood
I wake up lonely”
I'm not objective, I admit it.
But here, guys, let me tell you, this is nothing to joke about.
Tracklist Lyrics Samples and Videos
01 Our Hell (04:09)
First went wrong is hard to find,
We’re paralyzed, we apologize; our hell is a good life.
Last went wrong but where's my prize, under the lights?
Can we call it in? We'll be on the road.
Can we stop? When we stop,
My back will turn your face towards the fence.
What I thought it was it isn’t now
What I thought it was it isn’t now
All this weight is honest worse.
We’re moderate; we modernize 'til our hell is a good life.
All we know is to forget how to do right,
Colouring in the black hole. Can we stop?
When we stop my hands will shake,
My eyes will burn, my throat will ache,
Watching you turn from me towards your friends.
What I thought it was it isn’t now
What I thought it was it isn't
Punishment to stall what is done.
What I thought was in this is missing out.
What I thought it was it isn’t now
There’s a pattern in the system,
There’s a bullet in the gun.
That’s why I tried to save you, but it can't be done.
It can't be done.
02 Doctor Blind (03:57)
The lack of light, hollow sea,
Poison beaches, limousines
Toothless dentists, cops that kill...
My baby's got the lonesome lows,
Don't quite go away overnight;
Dr. Blind just prescribe the blue ones.
If the the dizzying highs don't subside overnight,
Dr. Blind, just prescribe the red ones.
Hard to hold, cold to touch,
Fall to pieces, treat the rush,
In hindsight, with prime time talk.
All your pain will end here.
Let the doctor soothe your brain, dear.
My baby's got the lonesome lows,
Don't quite go away overnight;
Dr. Blind just prescribe the blue ones.
If the the dizzying highs don't subside overnight,
Dr. Blind just prescribe the red ones.
04 Detective Daughter (05:10)
She was calling around to find half an hour.
She walked right into my mirror.
Says she's here to waste time I said "That's fine."
Listen, to thyself be true, to thyself be true
Every thread, every hair re-arranged to resemble
You could have her, detective daughter copy,
Please don't be me.
There are so many skirts under the table,
None of these long legs are mine.
She calls around finds me crying,
Wish I were capable of lying sometimes.
Hide out
Love is hell, hell is love.
Hell is asking to be loved.
Hide out and then run when no one's looking.
She's still calling around to find half an hour.
She'll always have a place in my mirror,
But she's got no more time, now she wants mine.
But I'm all out too.
To thyself be true
To thyself be true
To thyself be true
To thyself be true
Sure, it’s no big deal
05 The Lottery (03:45)
I only wanted what everyone wanted since bras started burning up ribs in the sixties.
Favors are flying, faces are falling and all I desire is to never be waiting.
If that's a crime, let's commit it.
There's a new crime, sexual suicide.
When our underwire radio tears into their international airwaves,
Boredom will die, ears will bleed,
And all they'll desire is to give, and to please...
There's a new crime, sexual suicide.
There's a new crime, let's commit it.
While we're waiting on the next day
To begin it in the best way.
There's a new crime, sexual suicide.
There's a new crime, let's commit it.
Don't worry Heather, about forever.
Don't worry about me;
It's the lottery, baby, everybody roll the dice.
It's the lottery, baby, everybody roll the dice.
Will we always be like little kids,
Running grove to grove, asking,
"Who loves me? Don't know who loves me."
It's pathetic, it's impossible,
Like girls in stilettos.
Like girls in stilettos.
Like girls in stilettos trying to run.
09 Nothing & Nowhere (03:24)
Sketch of your faces I still don’t know you aren’t permanent, permanent.
You want all of our moments stolen,
Blind alleys and hallways to basements.
How you gonna' hide 'till you disappear?
Because nothing and nowhere is golden.
Apartments are cages, I still don't know what is permanent, permanent.
Maybe all my possessions were precious.
Truth is all my possessions I somehow lost them.
Been traveling so light when we're floating by,
Seems nothing and nowhere is golden.
Some say we're lost in space,
Some say we're falling off the page.
Some say our life is insane,
But it isn't insane on paper.
Playgrounds are graveyards, and all of our scars are permanent, permanent.
There's no replacement for places.
I'll always love you, you're mine.
Numb is the new high, old memories die out, 'till
Nothing and nowhere is golden.
Some say we always only want to get off,
Some say our hands are much too soft.
Some say our life is insane,
But it isn't insane on paper.
Some say our hair is in our eyes,
Some say we're out of our little minds.
Some say our life is insane,
But it isn't insane on paper to have to ask
11 Winning (05:08)
To never open a book, always reading a magazine.
Outspend betting, if it looks like winning,
You haven't been.
Knives don't have your back.
I wait and I count,
But knives don't have your back.
I wait and I count to the last breath we take.
What we made doesn't make sense.
What's a wolf without a pack?
Open your chest and take the heart from it.
Open your chest:
What's bad? We'll fix it.
What's wrong? We'll make it all right.
All right, it's gone, we'll find it
Takes so long, we've got time,
All the time.
Some part of you, too small to lose.
Some part of you, too small to lose
All of us, all of you.
All of us, all of you
Counting to the last breath we take.
What we made doesn't make sense.
What's a wolf without a pack?
Open your chest and take the heart from it.
When you talk, can I tape you?
How'd you get what we don't know?
We don't know how to help,
Only know how to hound.
Nose to the grindstone.
Grindstone to the ground.
Don't even visit that place,
They'll sharpen their teeth on your smile.
I'm glad you didn't,
All our songs will be lullabies in no time.
What's bad? What's wrong? Make it all right.
All right, it's gone, so long.
We've got time, all the time.
All the time
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Other reviews
By SonOfNothing
Listening to 'Knives Don’t Have Your Back' is not easy, or at least not immediate.
Ghostly, suffocating, desperate. The dark side of Emily Haines.
