Weyes Blood - Titanic Rising - COMPACT DISCS [CD]

The phantom zone, the parallax, the upside down-there is a rich cultural history of exploring in-between places. Through her latest, Titanic Rising, Weyes Blood, a.k.a. Natalie Mering, has designed her own universe to soulfully navigate life's mysteries. Maneuvering through a space-time continuum, she plays the role of melodic, sometimes melancholic, anthropologist. Tellingly, Mering classifies Titanic Rising - which was written and recorded during the first half of 2018, after three albums and years of touring - as the Kinks meet WWII or Bob Seger meets Enya. The latter captures the album's willful expansiveness (InchYou can tell there's not a guy pulling the strings in Enya's studio,Inch she notes, admiringly). The former relays her imperative to connect with listeners. InchThe clarity of Bob Seger is unmistakable. I'm a big fan of conversational songwriting,Inch she adds. InchI just try to do that in a way that uses abstract imagery as well.Inch The Weyes Blood frontwoman grew up singing in gospel and madrigal choirs. (Listen closely to Titanic Rising, and you'll also hear the jazz of Hoagy Carmichael mingle with the artful mysticism of Alejandro Jodorowsky and the monomyth of scholar Joseph Campbell.) InchSomething to Believe,Inch a confessional that makes judicious use of the slide guitar, touches on that cosmological upbringing. InchBelief is something all humans need. Shared myths are part of our psychology and survival,Inch she says. InchNow we have a weird mishmash of capitalism and movies and science. There have been moments where I felt very existential and lost.Inch As a kid, she filled that void with Titanic. (Yes, the movie.) InchIt was engineered for little girls and had it's own mythology,Inch she explains. Mering also noticed that the blockbuster romance actually offered a story about loss born of man's hubris. InchIt's so symbolic that The Titanic wo