Somehow Joe Jackson snuck in front
of Julia Jacklin in the stacks. One of my favorite
records of 2022, Julia Jacklin’s Pre-Pleasure is
a mellow, moody mix of singer-songwriter
goodness, smart, evocative, sometimes funny
lyrics and Julia’s soft but rich singing voice.
“Lydia Wears A Cross,” the album opener, is
a vivid study of children in church and all
the baggage that comes with that. “I’d be
a believer if it was all just song and dance.
I’d be a believer if I thought we had a chance.”
And the third track on the album is an
intimate and courageous peak into early
adolescent desire, or maybe adult desire:
“been watching porn, lights off, headphones
on, right when the pleasure begins, my
education creeps in.” Those four simple
lines carry a ton of weight–enough
to keep the thoughtful listener stewing
for a while. And there is just something
so resonant and profound about a lyric
in which the speaker imagines herself
in a plane on the verge of crashing, and
as she comes face to face with her own
mortality, she says, “I’m too in love to die.”
That’s just brilliant. My favorite song
on this album is “Moviegoer,” so subdued,
holding so much space, melodically
unforgettable, and lyrically–wonderful
and confounding, with a chorus that
woefully reports the moviegoer down
twenty dollars for admission, while the
director is out twenty million, and a
verse that seems to describe the vastly
different worlds of the two main
characters, the consumer and the
producer. It’s a wildly effective tune.
This album is mostly quiet with a few
moments of rock intensity tossed in
for good measure, but overall, it’s a
brilliant record that I’m finding tonight
great pre and post pleasure in listening
to again.
Notes on the vinyl edition: Pre Pleasure, Polyvinyl Records, 2022, white vinyl.
In case you don’t already know: I’m listening to almost everything in my vinyl collection, A to Z, and writing at least one, sometimes two or three long skinny poem-like-things in response for each artist, and on a few occasions, writing a long skinny poem-like-thing in response to more than one artist. As a poet and a student of poetry, I understand that these things look like poems, but they don’t really sound much like poetry, hence, I call them “poem-like-things.” I’ll admit that they’re just long, skinny essays that veer every now and then into the poetic or lyric.
michael jarmer 