Fiona Apple

Maybe it was the annoying title, but Apple's (awesome) second record wasn't met with the sort of widespread acceptance that bathed her debut. Or maybe it was because this is one songwriter who could care less if people buy her records, so she puts whatever she wants in them. In this case, that means careening, jazz-heavy arrangements, weird noises, and no easy hooks.

So how about that album title? Read it as verse and it rhymes; read it as prose and it's Lewis
Carroll after too much Hungarian food. Read it backward and it proves that Lee Harvey
Oswald wrote Hamlet; read it out loud and realize that it doesn't make a damn bit of sense
no matter how you slice it. Talk about a statement of artistic purpose: Fiona Apple is
definitely not trying to pass for a modest pop professional yet. The title runs nin... More >

For any Upper West Side showbiz kid, musical comedy is mother's milk, more "natural" than the rude attack of rock or the polite confessional of folk. And having gone mega, Fiona was autonomous enough to want it that way. With crucial help from Jon Brion, she's got the Richard Rodgers/Kurt Weill part down, and will surely tackle the Dorothy Fields/Lorenz Hart part later. Meanwhile, confessional attacks like "A Mistake" and "Get Gone" will do. Webber & Sondheim, watch out. (Grade - A-)