PJ Harvey - Let England Shake

HERE WE GO

http://pitchfork.com/news/40804-pj-harvey-announces-new-album/

February 14, 2011

funny title for PJ. is this going to be a political album?

Oh there'll be an earthquake or some such, then they'll have to rename it "Polly Jean Harvey" or some such.

if that's the album cover on pfork -- is this the first pj album not to feature a photo of her?

I think that Uh Huh Her didn't feature her but a Polly impersonator, who also happened to write all the songs on the album.

Uh Huh Her had some excellent songs on it. She just didn't feel like recording them in a commercially appealing way.

uh huh her was great, certainly better than the album that preceded it

I thought Uh Huh Her was surprisingly good! Going low key was a good career move.

Colour me excited. I liked the last one for about 5 listens and then it never left my shelf, hopefully this can have more of the trademark venom which the name suggests.

Yup, political

Lots of autoharp by the looks of things. I'm approaching the idea of PJ Harvey doing explicitly political with some trepidation though...

autoharp makes me think joanna newsom placed her iphone with the tpain voice next to her instrument - plz say that is how it sounds

No it's a dulcimer-type thing. Chimey noises.

I think it's sort of a bummer that in recent years she's played down her strengths as a guitarist. Piano? Autoharp? No thanks. I did notice that the drummer on this thing is not Rob Ellis, which is a bummer, too. I just hope it's not another slog.

The first and only time I saw PJ Harvey live was a huge disappointment because she didn't play the guitar once.

Been waiting nearly a decade for Polly to rock again.

http://soundcloud.com/pjharvey/written-on-the-forehead/s-FnKW5

If England shakes it more than three times, it's playing with itself.

Terrible artwork

i dig written on the forehead, largely because she samples and loops a classic niney the observer song.

i'm intrigued by this album, even though i haven't been a big pj harvey fan.

um, excited about this
i trust her pretty implicitly, so if she wants to sound like j. newsom via tpain i will support that until she proves herself untrustworthy

EXCITED

OK. That song is fucking amazing people.

Not what I expected...

Holy fucking shit this is the best thing ever. You sure it is actually Peej though? Sounds nothing like her, even if it is t-pained

Sounds nothing like her

she never her does.

Think those are ospreys on the cover, which is kind of a weird bird to choose to represent 'England' (only one breeding pair here afaik, bird-fact fans)

Great comment from Mardi69 on Soundcloud:

This reminds me way too much of My Bloody Valentine and makes me worry that maybe you've got into heroin, Polly

She's not been T-Pained, she's been Karin Dreijer Andersson-ed. Sounds incredible and unexpected - I like the "blood, blood and fire" reggae dude in the background.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7rAwluPfa8

yeah sorry for some reason i forgot fever ray knife existed.

is that the same sample foxy brown used? i likes it.

Kind of on the fence with this. That reggae sample is making me think of crusty dance stuff, like Dreadzone or something. Plus the bass has been stripped out and acoustic guitars have been added and it's just left it really rhythmically flat.

it's very cool but needs to do more melodically, but why time to get one's hongro on when the essay is not finished? avaunt!

n.b. needs to do more melodically applies to the last bit where it's one chord-change away from glory and bottles it

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

not making up my mind yet but hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

the sample...it kind of sounds like she's accidentally played two completely separate songs at the same time

Eh? Sounds totally coherent to me.

it sounds like when i'm playing something in itunes and then accidentally click on to a website w/autoplaying music

This reminds me way too much of My Bloody Valentine

Mardi69's loss.

looking fwd to this -- white chalk would v. much be in my top albums of the decade, so high standard...

the more i listen, the more coherent the song sounds. it's like a call-and-response between harvey and niney.

i would gladly deign to have her baby were she to take up rockin' the guitar again.

Now deeply obsessed with this, I'll be quite surprised if this isn't my album of the year come December. It's just phenomenal.

i h8 u!

;_;

When is this released? Between this & the destroyer, i should really learn to find a cheap way to legally obtain records.

The first time I heard the "Blood & Fire" track it reminded me of something Sinead O'Connor would do, but that's cool.

Was this the album you tweeted about being one of the strangest albums of the spring...

When is this released?

Valentine's Day, which means it should be leaking any moment now.

what a great title

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

xp
not sure about that. it's a tough call between low and polly jean. right now it is low for me. they deliver something pj doesn't deliver. not sure how to call it. spirituality, communality, heart?

I hesitate too.

nah it's awesome, all time imo

and the last pj album I wholeheartedly loved was 4 track demos

i haven't been listening to a lot of new music this year really but i really like "the last living rose"

I adore this utterly.

I like White Chalk more, but yeah this is quite good.

alex otm

it's fantastic, though it worked for me more back in late winter/early (Chicago) spring than it does now that it's gorgeous outside.

New iTunes session is terrific. The versions of the songs from England are great and it's interesting hearing her sing a few of her older tunes in her new, higher register, particularly "Down By the Water".

And England hasn't dimmed at all since its release for me, I adore it.

pretty amazing gig at the royal albert hall last night. setlist -

Let England Shake
The Words That Maketh Murder
All And Everyone
The Guns Called Me Back Again
Written On The Forehead
In The Dark Places
The Devil
Dear Darkness
The Glorious Land
The Last Living Rose
England
Pocket Knife
Bitter Branches
On Battleship Hill
Down By The Water
C'mon Billy
The Piano
Big Exit
Hanging In The Wire
The Colour Of The Earth
-------------------------------
The Desperate Kingdom Of Love
White Chalk
The Sky Lit Up
Angelene
Silence

Great wasn't it? Though it felt more like theatre than a gig - I do think there', a way of presenting this material which allows a little more blood to flow, but I guess that's not her aim right now.

Saw John Pilger in the toilet queue. He was blaming NATO for her failure to play 50ft Queenie.

i was wondering what other ~famous people~ were in the audience. also wondering what the audience crossover will be with tori amos at the RAH tonight. i was glad she largely ignored her early material - it would have felt very out of place.

hadn't see this video of PJ actually managing to score an arts funding cuts point to david cameron in person.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vvDqF9x5J88

PJH: "economic gain seems to be the only goal of worth..."
Marr: "...you'd better go and get your guitar ready"

still the best album of the year, i think.

I can't recall the last socially "important" record that i've enjoyed as much as this. That clip from the Marr show is interesting in illuminating the discord between art and politics; fuckers even rolled the credits while she played.

Went to the show on Monday, after having spent the last week writing 5000+ words about her, fearing I might be a bit burnt out on LES - but it really was stunning. Like Dorian says, it did occasionally feel a little like a recital or something, though the band was great, and I loved the brass. I actually preferred it when she dropped the autoharp/guitar and ~performed~ a little more. Could have done with being *more* theatrical, imo: there was something uncannily creepy about those songs when she slowly sashayed out of the shadows at the back of the stage, wearing that headdress like she was halfway through transforming from a crow. Appropriately Halloweeny. Was struck by how much stronger I find the White Chalk/LES material than anything she's done before.

Look forward to reading the 5000 words. Who's it for?

Uncut - out beginning of December, still only £4.70!

Paying money for journalism? Not sure it will catch on.

man shame on andrew marr there!, that would have been so much more direct and worthwhile coming from PJH. letting it slip with a default 'difficult choices' blurb is terrible. you forget how generally awful a human being david cameron is until you see him just plainly functioning. sorry/derail

I've since watched the Marr clip a few more times and all i can say is: Occupy London, Threadneedle and/or Fleet Streets.

Context: 1987

I re-aquainted my high school principal during my second year of college where he tried to justify the nascent elimination of funding for district-wide busing versus (an extracurricular program of) football. His argument centered on the value of "team" -- arts funding had already long since been eliminated, but somehow, the "superiority" of this "group" dynamism usurped the potential of the entirety of the remaining populus.

A small percentage define the law of the whole. Assholes two decades fore and assholes du jour are redefining the context of the conversation and people are in great danger of losing themselves. Let England Shake, indeed; and also, Occupy.

i'm really behind on my pj listening. so, this album is pretty awesome! next up: white chalk.

I like that record even better.

this is still the record of the year, by some distance.

better than low's c'mon, malkmus' mirror traffic and vile's smoke ring for my halo? i don't think so. it's solid but it is not even the one of the best pj harvey album by any stretch. there is also the new kate bush which seems to be very good.

i'm fairly sure it is better than all three of those

i ended up putting it at #2 behind beyoncé in my guardian/bbc ballots but really those two and katy b are neck-and-neck, impossible to separate them.

This is my least played favorite album of the year (it's somewhere in the back end of my top ten or fifteen).

and, yeah, I also prefer Beyonce and Katy B's.

This is very easily my favorite album of the year, though I guess I haven't heard all that much.

my best of year too

second after katy b

better than low's c'mon, malkmus' mirror traffic and vile's smoke ring for my halo? i don't think so.

yeah, it's better than c'mon. and trust me, it pains me to say that, since (a) i'm a huge low fan and (b) up to this point, i've been fairly indifferent toward PJH. i really need to go back, in light of this album, and listen to the rest of her discography.

FWIW, i'm not a big malkmus solo fan, and i haven't listened to much of vile's disc (i do like what i've heard). BTW, i this 2011 has been a fantastic year. i've loved discs from, for instance, dirty-beaches, katy b, demdike stare, andy stott, lykke li, peaking lights, EMA, and many others. but let england shake is, to me, in a class by itself. obv., YMMV, but it reminds me of the vibe and power of the queen is dead, and that's high praise.

malkmus solo
he has had a new band for a while, the jicks, and that new album is definitely as good as the best pavement albums. i have always liked pavement at the time but i didn't love them, this new release, i love. but if you don't know pjh, you should definitely check out dry (still my fave), white chalk and to bring you my love. but tbh there is no bad pjh album.

what a beautiful album

yeah it's amazing

just listening to it finally for the first time today; fantastic

i almost hate to do this but....

"these these these are the words...."

http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/images/reviews/81/1203271076_1.jpg

"....the words that maketh murder"

haha! that is only funny because of the post above it. otherwise, so rong.

!!!!!

ok straight up I've done nothing else for the past couple of hours but read this thread & listen to "The Glorious Land" and "The Words that Maketh Murder" over and over again. Former is so good it almost makes me cry.

yeah i probably shouldn't have slept on this but i've never been into her stuff all that much. what a fantastic album; i am going to run out and buy it STAT.

oh and now i'm just discovering that white chalk is amazing what the fuck why did i sleep on these until now?

h8 my life sometimes

dude you must have missed the window where I was super-obsessed with this album, because I would have TOTALLY made sure you knew how amazing and awesome and otherworldly it is

wow, these albums are great! this totally sucks.

^ xkcd

lol

it's so good! i remember reading reviews at the time and they were so ambivalent--like, how could you possibly be ambivalent about this?

i don't even find it "hard to listen to" or anything--it's really beautiful.

The land returns to how it has always been.
Thyme carried on the wind.
Jagged mountains, jutting out,
Cracked like teeth in a rotten mouth.
On Battleship Hill I hear the wind,
Say "Cruel nature has won again."

What an album this is. Still is. Will be.

I live and die through England
Through England
It leaves a sadness
Remedies never were within my reach
I cannot go on as I am
Withered vine reaching from the country
That I love
England
You leave a taste
A bitter one
I have searched for your springs
But people, they stagnate with time
Like water, like air
To you, England, I cling
Undaunted, never failing love for you
England

Let's 'ave a ramble shall we? I am in this place a lot of the time. Not living in England anymore. Wouldn't want to any more, to be fair. The love frequently failing (for) you, England. Even more so now that 'England' does no longer represent the country or the land to me, having in my/its absence mutated into England as an abstract. England as an elegy for a sense of time and place I can't forget; a nuisance, a nagging distant memory that keeps tugging at you like a wasted beggar in the pub way past bedtime and salvation. You can't shake it when all you want to do is shake it off. Yesteryear regret and polaroid memories. The dinghy adrift at Porthcurno, the way river Calder forced the roads around it into odd shapes. Crawling your way to the George and Dragon. The tiny elves beneath the bough at Hardcastle Crags. All well and good. I cannot go on as I am: I cannot 'be' in that past and wouldn't want to, it annoys me frequently to have all this sneaking up on me when it's not convenient (it never is).

This masterpiece not so much amplifies it as discreetly summons the ghouls of that past, to have them quietly tiptoe around and cloud my head. I admire how much LES can un-bury and bring back to life. You learn to live with it after a while. It is a thing to admire.

Her most consistent and best record other than is this desire

In The Dark Places - what a track. And all in three minutes.