Shawn Colvin

I was a fan of Shawn Colvin even before she released her first record. There was a time, back in the 80s, when I was very much into folk music. I frequented places like the Bottom Line, and listened to radio shows like Mixed Bag with Pete Fornatale, Vin Scelsa's Idiot's Delight, and WFUV. I must have first heard Colvin when she guested on Scelsa's show, and I went to see her at a very small club in Greenwich Village called Speakeasy. Her opening act was John Gorka, another terrific singer-songwriter. The tiny place was packed, and it was a great show. I bought her hand-made cassette tape, and then when she had a major-label release I got that, and have purchased all her albums since then.

She has a new album out called These Four Walls, and I got it about a month ago and have listened to it about five times. I've had a hard time deciding whether I like it or not. I can say that it's not as strong as her first record, Steady On, or her Grammy-winning album, A Few Small Repairs. Her singing, as usual, is hauntingly beautiful. But much of the tone of the record, musically speaking, is a sort of lite FM quality that I don't dig much. Lyrically, however, there is more lurking beneath the surface. The title track starts, "I'm going to die in these four walls, I've had enough and tried it all," which is either the beginning of a suicide note or a massive shrug of resignation. And, in The Bird she sings, "We were still young like when me met, and I hadn't fucked it all up yet."

There are a couple of peppy numbers, such as Fill Me Up and Tuff Kid, and a couple of interesting covers--The Bee Gees "Words," and perhaps the most beautiful track is U2's Pride (In the Name of Love).