Kate Jacobs

You Call That Dark

2004-05-06

If Iris Dement worked with Yo La Tengo, you’d probably get music that’s sweetly voiced, ethereally recorded, sensibly country and slightly bitter. Or maybe you’d have a Kate Jacobs record.

Kate, along with career collaborator and former Yo La Tengo guitarist Dave Schramm, lovingly paints sympathetic character portraits of the down-trodden in America. In “What a World, What a God”, an old immigrant confuses the word “pain” with the word “cash” and refuses medical treatment thinking his doctors are trying to rob him blind (but aren’t they?). Dreams quietly die in “Pete's Gonna Sell” and “Helen Has a House”. “Tall Buildings” go up, yet the city goes downhill.

Kate makes a vain attempt to balance these maladies by instilling dreams and beauty in the life of her child in “Life Can Be Sweet”. Puzzle over the remaining lyrics as much as you'd like.

Sonically…it’s swirling country music augmented by Schramm’s numerous instrumental contributions.
We Call This Great.

Quick Links:

More reviews tagged #Folk

  • reviewed 09/2014

    BRIANNA LEA PRUETT
    GYPSEY BELLS

  • reviewed 03/2009

    LIZ DURRETT
    Outside Our Gates

  • reviewed 02/2008

    COWBOY JUNKIES
    Trinity Revisited

  • reviewed 06/2004

    Brother Henry
    Come On, People

  • reviewed 08/2016

    Genna & Jesse
    Asphalt Rhapsody

  • reviewed 05/2009

    THE INDIGO GIRLS
    Poseidon and the Bitter Bug

Compiled by the WYCE Journalism Club

The opinions expressed in these reviews are those of the individual volunteers that submitted the article and do not necessarily reflect the views of WYCE or GRCMC; nor its staff, donors, or affiliates.