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Published on 5/8/08
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No one does emotional devastation like Carla Bozulich, whose raw-throated incantations were the focal point of Ethyl Meatplow, the Geraldine Fibbers and Scarnella. For her 2006 disc, Evangelista, Bozulich rounded up potent multi-instrumentalists Tara Barnes and Shahzad Ismaily, as well as members of Montreal collective Thee Silver Mt. Zion. Reunited here under a new corporate identity, the group invests the nine tracks on Hello, Voyager with an improvisatory looseness.
Still, there’s no mistaking the album for an exercise in navel-gazing. “Lucky Lucky Luck” is a mordant bit of snuff jazz punctured with broken-glass shards of No Wave guitar. “Truth Is Dark Like Outer Space” offers a psych-grunge whoosh like you haven’t heard since Daydream Nation, and Bozulich wrings dread out of a singsong melody and ticktock rhythm in “Paper Kitten Claw.” The one spark in the gloom is the disarmingly lovely “The Blue Room,” which provides a moment of raised-lighter transcendence midway through.
Everything comes to a boil in the title track, which closes the set with a lurching barrage of clattering percussion and throbbing guitar. Bozulich sermonizes with the hypnotic fervor of a Pentecostal preacher: “Raise your hands and let me see what you can no longer hide!” she commands, adding, “It’s a relief that I can no longer hide myself.” Standing at the heart of her personal abyss, Bozulich rejects self-recrimination, instead offering deliverance through the power of love.
—Steve Smith
Evangelista plays Market Hotel Apr 18 and Cake Shop Apr 19, 2008.
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