return to menu of Pretenders articlesOriginally posted at:
http://netspace.org/indy/issues/02-08-96/arts2.html
Let's take for granted all that clamor she gets in her role as the mother of female hard rock. Let's take for granted all the pissed-off posing that pushes her through awkward interviews or reduces her to column fodder for starting fights at Joni Mitchell concerts. Let's excuse the depressing gigs that her A&R men give her that are somehow redeemed beyond all possible hope (see "Angel of the Morning" on the Friends' soundtrack). Let's take these things for granted so we can remind ourselves of Chrissie Hynde's terrific voice.
The Isle of View, a non-Unplugged unplugged album, frames Hynde's voice not with power chords or drums, but instead with strings, acoustic guitars, and harmonium. It's obviously a bad time to record an acoustic album--only another SupergroupTM or Lou Barlow project would be less welcome--but it's your loss if you let this underhyped, underfunded album fall through your consumer digits.
The disc, recorded with a string quartet in front of a live studio audience (sort of like a Friends episode, except for the strings), is no greatest hits collection. But let me remind you: this is a good thing. Part of the fun in hearing a live album is discovering what career benchmarks the artist acknowledges, what chestnuts are pulled out from mothballs, what classics make the grade and make the set list.
The Isle of View is nice in the respect that the set list is unpredictable. "I'll Stand By You"? Not here. "Don't Get Me Wrong?" Uh-uh. "Stop Your Sobbing?" That's not here, either. This isn't The Singles sans Marshall amps.
Okay, The Pretenders couldn't turn their back on "Back on the Chain Gang" (and what a lovely version it is, starting with a pretty parallel of two acoustic guitars simultaneously strumming, as the string quartet slowly emerges with the melody line). But the rest of the set list is surprising.
"Sense of Purpose," the non-single from a non-album (packed!) becomes a beguiling quest for something better: "Everyone chokes when they see someone cut down in their prime / It may not show when you look at me, but I know I'm in mine." "2,000 Miles" becomes an even prettier and sadder Christmas moment when Hynde's voice is held in that canopy the acoustic guitars create. And "Hymn to Her," with Hynde's voice complemented only by a slow harmonium progression, is the final proof that she is an amazing singer. In the absence of the guitars and drums which accompanied the original version, Hynde compensates and then some, taking every lilt and curve of the song, venting both strength and fragility, often in the same lyric.
Though the set list falls toward the end, and the album itself could do without a few songs (where is it written these days that artists must break the 50 minute mark on every album?), The Isle of View is a beautiful snapshot of the artist at the crossroads. Hynde is taking age just fine, thank you, as she reinterprets many of her older songs with playful, smart ingenuity. The album does what the good live album should do: leave the listener anxiously awaiting the artist's next step into the studio."
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