PJ Harvey - Stories Fromthe City, Stories Fromthe Sea

Mon 3rd Dec, 2007 in Music Reviews

While PJ Harvey is known to most for the raw, confrontional nature of her early albums, 2000’s Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea, her fifth LP, proved the English songstress was capable of much, much more.

Essentially, Stories… was Harvey’s first pop record. While To Bring You My Love (1995) toyed with the idea and Is This Desire? (1998) ventured away from her usual formula, Stories… delivered more mature and sophisticated songwriting and rich, expansive arrangments courtesy of collaborators and co-producers Rob Ellis and Mick Harvey.

There are plenty of moments on Stories… that echo the sounds of early albums Dry and Rid of Me. Aside from its subtle organ backing, opener Big Exit could easily have fit on either of those albums. But from the title alone, you get the idea that Harvey is leaving something behind. Or at least trying. And with the lyrics, it’s confirmed: “I walk on concrete/I walk on sand/but I can’t find/a safe place to stand”. This is Harvey torn between her home of Somerset in England and her time in Paris, London and New York. A quick look back at the album’s title and it all make sense now.

Moving through the album’s 12 tracks (13 if you count secret track This Wicked Tongue ) the range of sounds reflected beautifully the displaced feeling of Harvey’s lyrics. There’s the out-and-out pop on tracks like Good Fortune and You Said Something tying in with scene-setting lyrics referencing Little Italy, the Empire State Building and rooftops in Manhattan and Brooklyn; and then there’s the harder-hitting tracks with their busy instrumentation, describing the confusion and intensity of the big smoke ( The Whores Hustle and the Hustlers Whore, Kamikaze ).

The most telling moment on Stories…, though, is Harvey’s moving duet with Radiohead’s Thom Yorke for This Mess We’re in. Arranged around what appears to be a phone conversation between two long distance lovers, the song drifts from Yorke to Harvey to duet without ever settling completely. And as the song floats toward its end, Harvey’s echoes of Yorke’s vocals lag further and further, as the distance between the two prises them apart.

There are occasional flashes back to the days of Dry and Rid of Me, most notably on This is Love. Based around a bare minimum of chords, Harvey screams out as though it was 10 years earlier when she wanted to to lick her legs (of desire). But the mere presence of This is Love is indicative of Harvey’s scattered nature over the album’s 50 minutes. On the surface, this is smooth and sophisticated pop; but underneath it’s uncertain and, at times, uncomfortable and, knowing Ms Harvey, that’s completely deliberate.