Entertainers of every stripe and discipline are strange breeds of creature. For whatever reason, as soon as an individual gets into one quadrant or another of the arts and makes it in his or her profession, the grass begins to look greener on the other side of the septic tank; actors want to make music, musicians want to star in motion pictures, painters want to do theatre and writers want to direct. Why? Undiscovered countries are alluring territory when you’re unaware of the perils inherent in them. The most regular transgressors to brave the media swap tend to be actors; everyone from Sean Connery to William Shatner, Bruce Willis, Dennis Quaid and Juliette Lewis has stepped up to the mic at one point or another, with consistently mixed results. More often than not the outcomes range from poor to deplorable and tediously unmistakable. Now that she’s established her name and made an indelible mark as an actress, Scarlett Johansson is the newest victim to be ensnared by the ‘entertainer’s arrogance’ trap and her debut album, Anywhere I Lay My Head, digs into Tom Waits’ songbook and tries to give it a new coat of paint. It doesn’t work but, to be totally truthful, the fault isn’t Johansson’s.
The problem with this album can be placed squarely at producer David Andrew Sitck’s feet. Yes, Johannson’s vocals are tentative and uncertain—particularly on songs like “Who Are You” and “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up”—but these eleven songs are made all the worse by Sitck’s treatment of them.
What has always made Waits’ songs work is the fact that he has never made any move to polish them; he has always left the knicks, dings, cracks and warped moments in them to let them feel lived in and welcome—even when he’s going out of his way to jar listeners. Here though, each track is pressed, neat, clean and made presentable with slick instrumentation, often digitally-generated drums (check the title track that ends up sounding more like Sinead O’Connor, and “I Don’t Wanna Grow Up” that is made to sound like a reject from The Breakfast Club soundtrack) and often poor arrangements (“Green Grass” and “No One Knows I’m Gone” are the exceptions) that make the album sound like a bunch of demos made out of boredom between film roles and nothing more.
Without attempting to sound cynical, who is really surprised by these things? How much more could anyone have expected? There is a reason why the critical word most often associated with Tom Waits is “inimitable” and Anywhere I Lay My Head, while surely possessed of the best intentions, comes up very, very short of doing these songs justice. Fans that think there must be a way to cover Tom Waits well would be better served checking out Wicked Grin by John Hammond and staying as far from Anywhere I Lay My Head as possible.
Artist:
www.scarlettalbum.com
myspace.com/scarlettalbum
Album:
Scarlett Johansson – Anywhere I Lay My Head is out now. Buy it on Amazon.
