The Problem of Money
guilt
do I deserve it?
-Jim Morrison, As I Look Back
In Rilo Kiley's previous album, More Adventurous, Jenny Lewis sang about the first taste of success and how it can stifle creativity in the song It's A Hit:
Any idiot can play Greek for a day
and join a sorority or write a tragedy;
and articulate all that pain,
and maybe you'll get paid.
But it's a sin when success complains,
and your writers block- it don't mean s---.
Just throw it against the wall and see what sticks.
Gotta write a hit -- I think this is it.
It's a hit.
And if it's not,
then it's a holiday for a hanging.
And in her solo album, Rabbit Fur Coat, she uses a rabbit fur coat as a motif of illusion of riches and fame:
But mostly I'm a hypocrite
I sing songs about the deficit
But when I sell out and leave Omaha, what will I get?
A mansion house and a rabbit fur coat
As I've already sold out, there's a very real part of me that understands it. I understand the congressional aide turning lobbyist. I understand Johny Damon signing with the Yankees. I really don't mind. There's a natural progression and nobody wants to be stuck in Omaha all their career.
RK's previous three albums have been great, each one better than the previous. The themes have run deep and touched the sore subjects of love and resentment. This time around, the album deals more with the process of finding yourself and properly channeling harbored resentment. It takes heartbreak head on and finds that self-pity is faux martyrdom. It inspires foregoing the silver lining and continuing the search for gold.
Under the Blacklight is such a departure from their earlier equation of using folk and alt-country that it's quite possible to experience mild disappointment upon hearing it for the first time. It, however, is an anthem of freedom. What it doesn't offer in insight only revealed through regret, it makes up in terseness and resoluteness of independence; it is the sound of maturity and acknowledgment of being flawed.
If RK's previous album was about being more adventurous, this one feeds the kitty and takes that adventure to higher terrain. Under The Blacklight is perfectly apropos of looking at something with a different perspective and washing your hands of the past with its indifference. Under the blacklight, nothing is as it appears under halogen - it's usually filthier.
In other albums, Jenny often sang defensively, after the hurt had already settled in. This time, she summons the better post break-up angels ("Betrayal is a thorny crown - you wear it well, just like a king. Revenge is the saddest thing, Honey, I'm afraid to say - You deserve everything") but doesn't quite take their advice ("I never felt so wicked as when I willed our love to die") . Forget, but never forgive, she seems to sing - "You got your troubles, I got mine. On a clear day, I can read your mind." It is a respectful burial for all that did not turn out as expected, giving it the toast: "Here's to all the pretty words we will never speak."
Taking a chance like this is liberating for the artist and the listener. And yes, it feels good to be free.
