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Songwriter
and singer Sarah Donner is a brilliant example of how the most meaningful
artists illustrate significance in both their lives and work. This animal
rescue and mental health advocate is able to use her art in a such a way that
listeners feel quite willing to engage the empathy in such abundance throughout
her songwriting, but they likewise will never feel like Donner is attempting to
browbeat them into a particular point of view. Dogma is death to popular song
and Donner resolutely avoids that at every turn. Kittens Slay Dragons is a
remarkably apt title for this deceptively cathartic release – it isn’t a cry of
anguish that she unleashes here, however, but rather a full throated invocation
of her innermost self in a recognizable musical form. Big Big Heart, the debut
release for Kittens Slay Dragons, features a three piece configuration who make
a tremendous impression with electronica in a day and age where the genre seems
likely to be providing diminishing returns.
The
touch of synthesizers is readily apparent and Donner’s vocal on the opener, “Gatekeeper”,
is exuberant and quite inspired. This is certainly electronic pop, but it
undercuts the style’s reputation as a vacuous musical form. Instead, this pops
and crackles with immense intelligence and literacy that few acts or tracks
falling within this type of music can possibly equal. The album’s second song “Castiel”
continues the same spirit with even a little more discernible bounce than
before. The use of electronic instruments, however, never means that these come
off as cold compositions – a common knock on the style. Instead, Donner and her
collaborators use electronic instruments in such a way they radiate warmth and
have a pleasing live feel. The same intelligence guiding these previous songs
hits another level entirely on the track “Smile Pretty” – despite the artsy veneer,
there’s a hard-eyed clarity surrounding this song that sets it apart from the
other material. Much of this, however, can be lain at the feet of Donner’s
impassioned vocal.
The
title song makes one of the album’s more emphatic musical and lyrical
statements without ever straining too greatly for effect. The electronic
textures, however, are a little more challenging than before without ever
losing sight of the song’s melodic potential. It’s one of the album’s longest
songs, at this point, and has what you expect from a title cut – a sense of the
bigger picture, a thesis of sorts for what precedes and follows it. The
insistent pulse underpinning “Queer and Square” makes for one of the album’s
most bracing musical moments and Donner’s wide-eyed bray is impossible to
ignore. The same electronic pop sheen that makes much of Big Big Heart glow
continues in its closer “Head Down, Heart Up” but it avoids the cheese factor
that weighs down many similar efforts. Instead, it feels and sounds like a
strong closer for an album with irrepressible spirit and immense humanity.
Kittens Slay Dragons doesn’t come off, at any point, sounds like a one off or
vanity project. Instead, this has all the heft and entertainment value of an
abiding artistic statement and will garner a lot of justified positive
attention.
Grade:
A
Written
by Charles Hatton
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