My Brightest Diamond
Bring Me the Workhorse

THE REVIEW

There are records that you listen to for the first time absentmindedly, on afternoons with the windows open, without much conviction, thinking of a thousand useless annoyances. But you notice, as the songs follow one another and the sun sets, you notice that you are getting hypnotized. In the end, it’s dark, but you don't turn on the light. The diamond's light is enough.

My Brightest Diamond is Shara Worden. It is a record of eleven intense, lacerating pieces that leave a mark. It is a spectacular voice for its ability to be flexible, to modulate, to touch very different timbres, to transition from intimate shades to sophisticated and extroverted openings. It is the fusion between a dark indie rock and orchestral arrangements, between a dark soul and an operatic one. It’s the first new wave Bjork, it’s the most spectral PJ Harvey, it’s a more exhibitionist Beth Gibbons delivered to an orchestra of aspiring suicides.

There are pieces led by gloomy guitars that then open up to chamber operettas ("Magic Rabbit", "Something Of An End", "Golden Star"), there is a sense of anarchic and flamboyant extravagance ("Freak Out") that then gives way to a refined and melodramatic spirit ("Dragonfly"), there is a depression with Portishead-like bases that is accompanied by a proud gestation from liberty whirls with hands, in an atmosphere as dark as the night ("The Good And The Bad Guy": splendid).

You have strings over the dark, you have Kate Bush and Siouxsie Sioux. You are dazed, not knowing whether for better or worse. "Gone Away" is one of the most piercing pieces I have ever listened to: the abyss laid bare, the discomfort looked in the mirror and intertwined into garlands, the skinned winter. A piece that sends shivers. The instruments have the same cold elegance as the rigor mortis of a poor poet, and the grinning accordion at the end is like a blade, even though the voice remains proud, almost to the point of self-satisfaction.
 
The fact is that Worden's voice ensures that the pieces say an uncontainable amount in three minutes. The worst things and their grotesque reversal. Shara camouflages herself, changes costumes, like a quick-change artist. She knows how to be rational and drunk, lucid and disoriented, causing an excited confusion in the listener. "We Were Sparkling", without percussion, driven by an introverted and sinister guitar, unbalanced at the end by a music box, is the final blow. It's dark, but you don't turn on the light: it wouldn’t make sense.