Monday, March 31, 2008

I Didn't Let the Cat Out

Liz Phair has signed a new deal. Do you really care? Perhaps. Now that her relationship with Capitol is over, she may feel quite a bit less pressure to produce hits. Her pop leanings have been evident since day one, but the overall production aesthetic of her early work kept her raw and edgy. Her last two albums, though, have been slickly produced and mostly criticized by former fans. Truth be told, I thought her self-titled album (the one with Why Can't I? and Extraordinary) was quite good and a perfect summer album. Somebody's Miracle, though, was less than miraculous.

The best news in all of this for the hard core fans is that ATO, her new home, will be reissuing her full-length debut Exile in Guyville on June 24 complete with a bonus DVD and unreleased tracks.

Fans will be most jazzed for the "Guyville" documentary "Guyville Redux" on the bonus DVD, which finds Phair interviewing Chicago music scene vets like producers Steve Albini and Brad Wood, her former Matador compadres Gerard Cosloy and Chris Lombardi, National Public Radio host Ira Glass and actor John Cusack.
A new album will follow this fall.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Exile in Guyville is a classic.