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The Rice Thresher
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Garett Merriam thresher staff Review: **** (out of five) Haunted, the sophomore release from singer/songwriter Poe, is one of the most brilliant concept albums in years. It's also appropriately titled, since the album is possessed by the spirit of Poe's father, documentary filmmaker Tad Danielewski, who died in 1993. It's been five years since the release of Poe's debut album Hello, which garnered attention for the single "Angry Johnny." In that interim, she came across a box of old cassette recordings of her deceased father's voice. Poe, who co-produced the new album, was terrified as first, but quickly became fascinated with the recordings and used them to direct the development of Haunted. Through sampling, Poe incorporated her father's ghost into nearly every track on the album. Musically, Haunted bears little resemblance to Hello. The avant-garde/alterna-funk sound that was the trademark of her debut takes a backseat to a spookier sound with lots of reverb and echo on Haunted. It's far from gothic, but there is an undeniable eeriness to the album. It's this quality that landed "Wild," the album's seventh track, on the soundtrack of Book of Shadows: Blair Witch 2. The 17-track album opens with "Exploration B," an actual message Poe left on her mother's answering machine. After hearing the outgoing message, Poe sings an impromptu song to inform her estranged mother of her father's death. The opening lyric "I thought you should know/Daddy died today" sets the tone for the album perfectly. The title track, one of the best on the album, follows. Through several carefully layered vocal tracks and a m‚lange of perfectly harmonized guitars and keyboards, the song echoes in the listener's ears long after it's come to a close. At the end of this track we hear the first of several segues involving a recreated conversation between "Anne" (a young Poe) and her father. Almost all of the songs are intertwined with segues from Anne and her father. Other songs, such as "Not a Virgin," "Could Have Gone Mad" and the first single "Walk the Walk," are more adrenaline-based, driven by strong rhythm guitars and powerful metronomic drums. Although the album only slightly resembles Hello, "Terrible Thought" and "Lemon Meringue" might remind listeners of it. Toward the end, the sultry "Spanish Doll" stands out on the album for its flamenco-style acoustic guitar. A reflection back on childhood memories, the song is simultaneously comforting yet, in the context of the album as a whole, undeniably creepy. The valediction "If You Were Here" closes and encapsulates the album beautifully, being equal parts ballad and epitaph. The song goes back and forth, sung by Poe on the one hand and spoken by her father on the other. The conversational piece occurs over an orchestral backing as Poe makes amends with her deceased father. After an emotionally charged exchange, a young Anne tells her father, "It OK, you can go now." Among the other remarkable aspects of the album is its strange relationship to the critically acclaimed novel House of Leaves by Mark Z. Danielewski, Poe's brother. Both the novel and the album draw on experiences from their shared past and their relationship with their father. The liner notes to the album provides a cross-reference of where aspects of the album intersect on which pages of the novel. On the downside, the segues, though conceptually brilliant, can get a little repetitive at times and tend to interrupt the songs rather than serving as transitions. After listening to the album in its entirety, it may be more enjoyable to skip the segues and go straight to the next wonderful song.
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