By: Dylan Schink
My Brightest Diamond | website | facebook |
Released on September 15, 2014 via Asthmatic Kitty Records
This Is My Hand is a landmark album for Shara Worden, the creative force calling herself My Brightest Diamond since 2006’s Bring Me The Workhorse. She’s successfully taken elements from her previous three albums: The rock energy from Bring Me The Workhorse, the string arrangements of A Thousand Shark’s Teeth, and the unique theatricality of All Things will Unwind. The result is spectacular.
This Is My Hand has noticeably more electronic elements than Worden’s older work, but they’re restrained. She clearly knows exactly what she’s doing with them and doesn’t let them define the album or detract from the excellent instrumental performances delivered by her backing band, especially the bassist, whose funk influenced riffs play excellently with Shara’s unusual delivery.
The opening track, ‘Pressure’, is an instantly recognisable My Brightest Diamond track, but with almost 65daysofstatic-ish interludes of powerful drums over fuzzy electronic backdrops. It kicks off the album and sets a funky, energetic tone. ‘Pressure’ leads into ‘Before The Words’, which darkens the tone slightly but ups the volume and intensity. The next three songs continue with this setup of suddenly pulling instruments in and out of the arrangement and outstanding vocals by Worden. ‘Lover Killer’ at one point goes almost fully indie funk before leading out with an almost classic rock blend of slightly lo-fi vocals and big instruments.
The second half of the album is more subdued and not as absorbing as the first, but it’s still very strong and falls more toward A Thousand Shark’s Teeth or the slower moments of Bring Me The Workhorse; with the exception of ‘Resonance’ the songs don’t have the rapid development the first half did. The second half is still very strong, and leads the album out well.
Before This Is My Hand, I liked My Brightest Diamond, but I always wanted to like her more than I really did. I loved her unique, stage-whisper like delivery, subdued and airy but with massive power behind it. I loved her bigger songs (All Things Will Unwind is worth the price of the album for one song), but I always felt like her albums had a lot of forgettable filler on them. This Is My Hand has no filler, even its slow moments are well crafted and beautifully delivered. Unquestionably Shara’s best work, it’s an album I’ve been absolutely addicted to ever since I got hold of it.
