Elliott Smith

Elliott Smith – New Moon
Post-humous releases always get eyed fishily, as if monied interests rather than artistic gold weight the hook of the vault clearing. Besides, Elliot Smith recorded six gorgeously melancholy albums, withholding from his perfect canon anything resembling second rate. But distrust not, what has been bound together on the two disc of New Moon is twenty four tracks from Elliot’s golden era: the acoustically rich period between 1994-97, before he nervously set foot upon an Academy Award show stage, a time which saw the release of his self-titled album and Either/Or. With little more than a guitar, an 8 track recorder miked closely, and his layered double lead vocals, Elliott composes waltzes (“Going Nowhere”), accusatory admonishments (“Georgia, Georgia”), and a tender re-interpretation of Alex Chilton’s “Thirteen”. There's a torture in New Moon, like the remembrance of your inability to assist a now-deceased friend, a dark brood where the night seems ironically too dark and too short. The beauty is in its sadness, and how much it can sound like yours.