There are a lot of musicians in this indie world, such as Dan Deacon, whose careers are essentially only possible thanks to recent developments in technology. It's not that there's no talent there, but like some obtuse ore buried miles under diamond-hard rock, it's taken us humans a while to invent the gadgets to extract it.
Basia Bulat is not one of those musicians. She is like a five-pound nugget of gold sitting in an barely bubbling inch-deep creek. Tapping these riches is about as easy as tying your shoe—sit down on the couch next to her, give her the phone book to sing, and prepare to be wowed.
I'm not sure that one could really call it a problem, but if there's an Achilles heel to all of this, it's that this kind of prodigious talent makes it all sound a little too easy. Bulat draws from a very familiar folk template throughout Heart Of My Own, and this fact, combined with her attention-grabbing voice, threatens to reduce the songs themselves to playing a bit part.
Is this more of a symptom of an age in music that often puts a higher premium on innovation than is sometimes warranted? True, the thrill of this record—and Bulat's talent in general—is not in hearing something you've never heard done before, but in the opportunity to hear this girl sing with her quivering cannon of a voice. And even at this young age, she has the maturity to understand when to rein it in, producing some the record's most deeply-affecting tracks ("Sparrow" and "Gold Rush").
Sure, Bulat is still likely a record or two removed from making a truly classic album—one woven with the kind of experience and weight that only time can provide. But if that sounds like a slight on Heart Of My Own, it's not. This is a very good record. It's merely recognition of the fact that, for a singer this talented, the best should be yet to come.
(Basia Bulat will perform a live in-store set here in our shop on Tue. Feb 16 at 7pm.)