Silence

CD Cover Tara MacLean
Nettwerk

Review by Darren Gawle



45-second excerpt from "Let Her Feel the Rain" (various formats)


Tara MacLean is lying to us: there is in fact no silence on this album (aside from a second or two between tracks, but that doesn't count). Furthermore, the sound that we do get here is the usual Nettwerk experience of a female vocalist who sounds not entirely unlike like Sarah McLachlan (really? do tell...). This is getting more than a little tedious; and, in fact, I'm going to come out and accuse Nettwerk Records of insulting the public's intelligence. Having found the divine Miss M to be a bankable commodity, it would appear that Nettwerk has decided on cornering the woman-with-ethereal-vocals-and-folky-songs market (there's also the Rose Chronicles, Delerium... ). Do they really think that we're so simple-minded as to accept any Sarah sound-alike that comes walking through the door? Or is it just a marketing plan to keep the money rolling in while we wait for the real deal to release a new album of new material?

That said, Tara MacLean is a capable songwriter, and she's a far better singer than I'll ever be. Silence is also a well-recorded album: its tones are crisp and clean, and the drumming sounds particularly full and warm. It's just unfortunate that MacLean's sound is so easy to be pigeonholed; and once the new Sarah McLachlan album comes out later this month, it will remain to be seen if she'll hold her own in such a saturated market.




First published in Drop-D Magazine on July 5, 1997

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