Ann Reed - Carpediem

Now are the days to sieze this reissue

Alarm bells ring: Track Five, Slimy Cat. Fortunately visions of Phoebe screeching Smelly Cat on Friends are unfounded, as Ann Reed’s tune is a 12- string instrumental in the vein of Leo Kottke (maybe this cat got too close to the Vaseline Machine Gun?). Her 1981 debut album kicks off with Can’t Be Easy, dominated by a tootlin’ flute. Luckily, it’s swiftly followed by Jessie, wherein Reed’s beautifullytoned Hoffman guitar is accompanied by upright bass and mandolin, creating a timeless slice of Americana. She sure can play that guitar – the comparison with Kottke is not fanciful, though Reed’s songwriting extends to the lyrical too.

Her voice has touches of Joni Mitchell but the delivery is distinctively her own, while the anonymous sleevenote contributor who writes, “Her voice rests on those bass tones like a boat on a still day’s water,” gets it exactly right.

Not all of this album is great – the arrangements are sometimes too lush, though always well played – but it has enough greatness to make you wonder why it didn’t catch first time around, and to make you thankful for the Korean reissuing operation that has given it a second chance.

4 stars 4 stars 4 stars 4 stars

Big Pink | 11

Reviewed by Tim Holmes
<< Back to Issue 363

Login Here

Free Newsletter


Subscribe to
our email newsletter by emailing:

anna.bowen@
metropolis.co.uk