Albums of the Year # 12 Courtney Barnett - Things Take Time, Take Time

 

 

I'm always really pleased when Courtney Barnett shows up. She's been pretty much a constant in my life since my sister directed me to Avant Gardener, cher break out tune back in 2013. I've seen her three times since, each time just terrific. She's a perfectly formed Indie star. Just what I was looking for when she turned up without even realising it and great company ever since.

Things Take Time, Take Time, her third album in all, is just out. Strange, feels like a lot more and that she's something of a stalwart by now. I guess it's five really, if you include The Double EP: A Sea of Split Peas, from when she first arrived in  2013 and Lotta Sea Lice, her terrific collaboration with Kurt Vile four years later. You should really, as they were all important steps in her journey.

Courtney doesn't really change dramatically, her style is so well honed and immediately recognisable,  but she does refine her sound and disclosures. Things Take Time, Take Time is her cleanest and clearest album yet, both lyrically and musically and may well be her best. Time willtell in that respect.

It's certainly her sparsest, the whole record seems as if it's been tabulated to the finest degree in terms of offering a simple and to my ears, really heartfelt statement and one that is clearly a Lockdown one, reflecting the changed condition and conditions that most of us have been experiencing and living under for the past two years.

Courtney's been going through changes recently. The end of a long term relationship, bereavements, the ones world's events forced on her along with the rest of us. She's also changed her working processes, from working with the three-piece band that she's been operating with since her early days to another collaboration, with Warpaint drummer Stella Mozgawa. She seems comfortable here. Things Take Time, Take Time is an assured and lucid record. It's organic and it flows. In the words of Teenage Fanclub, Everything Flows.

In a recent Guardian interview Courtney said she wants the record to sound like a 'comforting arm (around) a friend.'That's a wonderful description of the album and in that respect it's beautifully successful. The first thing I felt when I started listening to the record early on Friday morning, (I've had it on loop pretty much ever since), was that it was great to hear her voice again and how much I'd missed her. I think of her as a friend and I'm not ashamed to say that I love her. I can't actually think another musician I'd say that about. That's Courtney's specific quality and her charm. A real immediacy and genuineness. The sense that you feel like you know her.

So the record has space and warmth. It muses on mortality. Our own and that of the planet we live on .It shows a wonderful shift in terms of her playing style. Everything rings like a bell. Clarion clear. There are the customary reminders of heroes of hers. The Velvet Underground, Dylan, The Lemonheads. Less so Nirvana this time around. She's also been listening to Eno, Arthur Russell and Leonard Cohen apparently. It shows. Less is clearly more.

There are also occasional reminders, to me at least, of Go Between's Grant McLennan's wonderful, minimalist songwriting style.When I last saw Courtney and her band they played a wonderful version of McLennan's Streets of Your Town. It seemed as if it might have been written for them. It's a great gift being able to talk simply, clearly and purely. Courtney and Grant both have it. I wish more people did. 

So, all in all it's great to have her back and the record is worth the wait. She's an artist who asks good questions and doesn't offer easy answers. I guess we're all a bit confused right now. Courtney doesn't bother to hide the fact but she's definitely working on it. Trying to get there. It wil be really interesting to see where she goes next.