Mirah Yom Tov Zeitlyn
was the daughter of artistic parents, so perhaps
it was always a given
that he life would lead her in that direction. The
collision of art and commerce struck her early – she
began her musical career playing wedding parties and
bar mitzvahs to earn extra cash while fronting the
jazz band the Hot Set in the indie rock hotbed of Olympia,
WA.
Mirah began writing her own brand of lo-fi, slice-of-life
indie pop, a style that was quickly gaining popularity
in the mid-1990’s thanks to the likes of now tragicomic
artiste de what? Liz Phair. It wasn’t long before
people began to sit up and take notice of Mirah,
known around small-town Olympia as having the sexiest
voice in rock. Phil Elvrum of the psych-pop group
the Microphones invited her to contribute to Don't
Wake Me Up and Window, and a star was
born.
If anything, her fourth album C’mon Miracle her
most esoteric and ‘difficult’ album to date, and
the immediate pop songs that were found on recent
effort Advisory Committee arewell and truly
absent. For the most part, the songs represented
here are paired down by Elvrum, with the very notable
exception of “The Light”, “We’re Both So Sorry” and
to a certain extent “The Struggle”, where his multi-instrumentalist
skills come to the fore.
It’s this precisely difficult nature that makes C’mon
Miracle a sometimes difficult album to love,
even if it’s easy to respect Mirah’s decision to
alter her approach. “The Dogs of B.A.”, inspired
by her trip to Buenos Aires, is easy on the ears,
while the closing “(Exactly Where We’re From)” at
least follows on from the delightful piano-driven “Promise” by
stretching and pulsing with interesting moments
and a playful approach. C’mon Miracle is
an engaging listen, but not always an easy one.
