01-Shilpa Ray-I Is What I Is
02-Shilpa Ray-Mother Is A Misanthrope
03-Shilpa Ray-Posted By Anonymous
04-Shilpa Ray-Lessons From Lorena

Shilpa Ray’s music could best be described as a tour through the highlights of 20th century New York’s grandest musical contributions: a combination of jazzy phrasings, Velvet Underground haziness, and No Wave harshness, evened out by some cabaret stylings and country flourishes. In short, Ray embodies New York’s melting pot spirit, but she knows how to ladle it out, too. She’s also something of an inspiration to rising musicians who have the talent but not the name recognition.
After years of club dates, Ray was brought to the attention of Nick Cave, who whisked her and her harmonium away on a Grinderman tour of the States and has since become something of a Shilpa Ray champion, releasing her EP, It’s All Self-Fellatio, on his Bad Seed Ltd. label, and enlisting Ray as opener for the Bad Seeds current tour of England and Europe. In four songs that will likely draw the largest collection of ears to her music, Ray takes on the role of social observer, reporting on current events with a ribald air over quiet and dark backdrops.
If, to you, this sounds like Ray following her mentor’s lead, than your assumptions aren’t entirely wrong, but they are maybe dismissive. Like Cave, Ray can do harsh or soft, she can pull a flashy line or two, but musically, and especially vocally, she is her own beast. Anyone who has heard Ray previously knows she can caterwaul, but here her deliveries are more subdued; it’s an approach that makes her words cut all the more. Whether mulling over racist cooking show host Paula Deen or last year’s Boston Marathon bombing, Ray imbues her words with enough drama and enigmaticism to make her songs appealing even to those who don’t keep up on the news. Opener 'I Is What I Is' features nothing more than Ray and piano, but her bright, clear voice captivates throughout. The slightly show-tuney aspect of the melody could threaten to overtake lesser singers, but Ray has been steering this ship awhile and still has ample control.
Ray may be formidable on her own, but 'Mother Is A Misanthrope' and 'Posted By Anonymous' show her backing band are bringing their own finesse to the proceedings, thank you. Most notable is the lovely pedal steel lines of Jon Catfish Delorme, most notable for how his twangy riff on 'Mother Is A Misanthrope' steers its cabaret nuances in an entirely different direction.
Ultimately, however, Ray’s harmonium reigns supreme. It is the only instrument that could make narcotic EP closer 'Lessons From Lorena' even hazier. Paired with Ray’s ability to sound like a long lost blues singer who only the most desperate of vinyl enthusiasts are privy to, lines like, "Though I’m not heaven sent, I believe / You’re always going somewhere when you leave", sound like holy intimations at the start of a gutter-dawning day. The ugly, the beautiful, the sacred, the infamous, and the profane. Sounds like a fine opener for Nick Cave, yes, but also a vital performer in her own right. (Maria Schurr/thequietus.com)
You’d have to have been reading this blog for a long time to be able to follow the reasons why I’m excited to see the release of this EP. Well over five years in fact. I first wrote about Shilpa Ray’s previous band, "Beat The Devil", back in early 2008, and then when she dissolved that band and released her debut album with the "Happy Hookers" I covered that too, about a year and a half later. I have to confess I thought she was basically done, given I’d not heard mention of her since 2010, but it’s nice to see people sticking it out when so many give up and fade away. As much as I loved the Beat the Devil stuff, however, I had my reservations about the new material. Shilpa Ray is a little like Angel Olsen in the sense that she has a phenomenal, striking and old-fashioned voice. A little like Angel Olsen too, she seems to be forever on the brink of over-doing it, and some of the early Happy Hookers stuff seemed to suffer from that. The vocals were a bit too strained, and it all felt a bit contrived, of forced somehow. I kept wishing she’d take it a bit easier.
Her voice is clearly striking enough, there is absolutely no need to push it, and actually here she doesn't, which is what makes the EP so good. The earthy, bluesy sound is still there, but without that strain her voice just sounds menacing, an effect emphasised by the rather ominous harmonium which has been a feature of her music from the very start. It’s a dark, unhurried EP which deals in waves rather than hooks, with Ray’s voice rising and falling in duet with the harmonium, part lament and part threat.
She's touring with Nick Cave at the moment actually, which perhaps explains why physical copies of this only seem to be available from his web shop, and also means that I will get to see her live in a couple of weeks when that particular tour comes to the Usher Hall. I get the impression that will tell me much more about where Shilpa Ray stands now as these four tracks. And that voice in a live setting could be amaaazing! (Matthew/songbytoad.com)
Die CD sieht noch super aus. Es handelt sich hier um eine EP in einem Foldout Papp-Cover. Es sind minimale Spuren an der Papphülle und an der CD zu finden, das beeinflusst das Abspielen und den Hörgenuss aber in keiner Weise. Falls ihr die Songs im mp3-Format braucht, und keine Möglichkeit habt, die CD selbst zu rippen, lasst es mich wissen. Ich kann euch die mp3-Files per Download zur Verfügung stellen. Das gilt übrigens für alle CDs, die ich hier anbiete.