new introductory bit here.

This is a reviews page based on my own collection, which just keeps growing despite itself. If it isn't listed here, it's because I don't own it yet, or I haven't gotten around to it yet.

Also, bother your local "new rock" radio station and make sure they are playing "new rock" and not "Rock the Casbah," which is not new.

note: entries in red text indicate my pick for the artist's best available album. A gold numeral indicates the POPocalypse winner of the year's best album; second- and third-place winners are in blue. Green lettering indicates an obviously exploitative record company compilation without apparent artist input.

Born in California and raised in New York City, Suzanne Vega was one of the first folk singers of her day to cross over into mainstream success after folk had spent years marginalized as commercially unviable by the record companies. The major labels had a dim view of women folksters in the early 80s, and Suzanne spent years in coffeehouses building a strong following with her Dylanesque tales of other people's lives and problems before A&M signed her. Suzanne Vega, her 1985 debut, avoids the "songs about other people" pitfall by including several tracks from a first person perspective. She still keeps her distance in the songs, unable to give true emotion to either herself or her subjects. The result is listenable, thanks in no small amount to her performance and the commercial production by Lenny Kaye and Steve Addabbo, but it simply isn't warming.

Vega's critical accolades continued the following year when she contributed the wonderful track "Left of Center" to the soundtrack of John Hughes' teen film Pretty in Pink (a soundtrack which was de rigeur for class of '89ers, I'll have you know). While not a single in America, the video got extensive MTV play, which ensured the executives would be paying attention to her next offering, which was the hit "Luka," a fragile, soaring and oddly upbeat song about child abuse. The lead single from 1987's Solitude Standing, it was a top 10 hit in Britain and America.

Standing is a more personal-feeling record than her debut, and is considerably more engaging because her vocals have more strength and more warmth than her debut. All of the songs really pull the listener in to their stories, and the title track is particularly warm and emotional. If anything dates the album, it's the unusual way it opens with an acapella song called "Tom's Diner" -- not the last time we'd hear that number -- and closes with an instrumental version of the same song. This "bookending" feels cheap; clever for the sake of being clever. Regardless, the actual observation of the lyric is memorable, and every song that "Diner" bookends is truly wonderful.

Days of Open Hand followed in 1990. Now co-produced by guitarist Anton Sanko and featuring guest contributions by Philip Glass and Shawn Colvin, it hides under a poorly-designed sleeve resembling a 1950s high school textbook, with an obvious and trite "hand" theme. This was her most "pop" oriented work to date, with more conventional song structure and standard five-piece band arrangements. Despite the mainstreaming of her musical sound, Suzanne sounds more open and honest than ever before. One song, "Fifty-fifty Chance," comes off as phony (it's like Depeche Mode's "Blasphemous Rumours" without passion) but the remainder of the songs are easily among her best. "Men in a War" has a very odd lyric evoking limbless soldiers to use as a metaphor, and the matter-of-fact arrangement belies how strange it feels to hear such a set of lines. "Book of Dreams" was a minor hit, and a compellingly beautiful one.

Around the same time, Suzanne had a left-field hit when the dance act DNA added a simple, thumping beat to "Tom's Diner." The unlikely combination clicked with listeners and was a top 5 hit in England and America. Teaming with Mitchell Froom, she explored similar experiments in rhythm and beat on 99 F. The album was an uneven, if listenable mix of Hand's pop (best shown on the beautiful "In Liverpool") and harsh, grinding, clanking rock. The album's short standout track "Blood Makes Noise" sounds like it was recorded in a factory. The approach led to some critical consternation, particularly in the purist folk enclaves, and didn't really click with audiences either. Four singles were pulled in England and not a one hit the top 40. Vega and Froom began dating shortly after their collaboration, and married in 1993.

During their marriage, which ended in 1999, Vega produced one album, 1996's unmemorable Nine Objects of Desire. The album spawned no hits, and frankly the attempt at traditional pop did not fit her. It's a very "safe" album, and despite the maturity in her vocals and the passion in the delivery, there aren't any hooks or powerful moments to take away.

Vega continued to tour and promote both Objects and a compilation (Tried & True) through 1998. The following year, her marriage ended, and the lyrical evidence implies it was not a happy one. 2001's astonishing Songs in Red and Gray begins with one of her very best numbers, "Penitence," which concerns loss of faith. The first line of the second song goes "Consider me a widow." Other songs take a disturbingly close look at domestic violence and deep regret. The overall result is chilling and compelling, although poor advertising and distribution meant that it did not sell well. Towards the end of the year, she was touring to support the album. (2/02)