Music

[Spoken word]

Patti Smith and Kevin Shields

The Coral Sea

Image
Annie Zaleski

Patti Smith’s 1997 book The Coral Sea is a slim but powerful volume of prose she wrote in tribute to the late artist Robert Mapplethorpe, who photographed her for the cover of Horses. The album named after Smith’s tome is a double-disc collection featuring two live collaborations from the NYC punk-poet and Kevin Shields, best known as the reclusive guitarist and noise manipulator behind My Bloody Valentine.

As might be expected, Sea the LP is nontraditional. Each disc contains an hour of vivid spoken word delivered in Smith’s iconic, husky voice, while Shields contributes musical accompaniment in the form of drifting abstract textures and ambient desolation. In other words, Sea succeeds despite unorthodoxy, because it highlights the strengths of each performer.

Shields’ soundscapes are droning and barren, with occasional forays into feedback—think of an astronaut tumbling slowly through space—but ebb and flow seamlessly in sync with Smith’s own emotional cadences. The end of the 2006 performance, for instance, finds Shields sculpting comet-trails of speckled drone, as Smith forcefully asks, “What is the point? What is the point?” with growing desperation and passion; when she finally answers her own question—“You! You are the point!”—Shields’ music has imperceptibly risen in volume to match her tone.

While casual fans might have no need to listen to this collection again—and those who dislike Smith’s voice will find Sea intolerable—the combination of vocals and music is oddly soothing, like conversational white noise without the clutter.

The bottom line: ***1/2

Share

Previous Discussion:

Top of Story