Music
Connie Converse was a folk-music genius. Then she vanished
The US female singer-songwriter made stunning, forward-thinking songs in the 1950s, but was barely known – and aged 50, she disappeared. Now, with a new re-release of her music, she’s recognised as a trailblazer.
By Thomas Hobbs
Centring on an edgy, city-dwelling female protagonist unapologetically owning her sexuality, the brilliant song Roving Woman sounds like the work of a millennial musician. Evoking the smoky, airborne notes of a late-night Brooklyn bar, it contains lilting guitar harmonies that float in and out of focus like cascading cigarette smoke, while its melancholy vocal is reminiscent of popular contemporary folk musicians like Weyes Blood, Jessica Pratt and Angel Olsen. “Someone always takes me home!” the lead singer swoons.
Yet the truly remarkable thing about this track is it was actually recorded more than 70 years ago. Roving Woman isn’t the work of some lo-fi singer-songwriter in their early 20s, but is in fact the forward-thinking creation of Connie Converse. She was a bedroom musician who wrote the bulk of her songs in early 1950s New York, years before Bob Dylan came on the scene and sparked a new singer-songwriter movement.
But she pulled back from her musical dreams at the turn of the 1960s and then, in 1974, aged 50, disappeared completely – never to be heard from again. It was only this century that this mysterious artist’s work was rediscovered and has found a devoted audience, stunned by just how pioneering she was. And now a new vinyl re-release of the 2009 cult compilation How Sad, How Lovely, should only make her more popular.
Review: Beth Orton Demands Your Attention on ‘The Ground Above’
“What has kept me alive is feral invincibility,” Beth Orton wrote in an Instagram post announcing her new album The Ground Above, out June 26 on Partisan. The songwriter unflinchingly stares down life three decades into her career.
By David Harris
“What has kept me alive is feral invincibility,” Beth Orton wrote in an Instagram post announcing her new album The Ground Above, out June 26 on Partisan. “Grief had me say yes to life, to embrace and taste and devour,” Orton wrote later in the note, perhaps best summing up the paradox inherent in her music.
The Ground Above continues the trajectory from Orton’s last record, the career-best Weather Alive (2022). Orton, who began as a folk/trip-hop musician 30 years ago on debut record Trailer Park, has held onto the melancholia of her early music, but largely eschewed the electronic dance beats that defined her work. Instead, Orton leans into the immersive, dreamy sounds of Weather Alive to craft a new album that veers more closely toward late-night jazz clubs than music for the spacey set.
Working again with collaborators Adrian Utley (Portishead) and Shahzad Ismaily (Ceramic Dog) and joined by Nick Hakim and drummer Tom Skinner (the Smile), Orton uses The Ground Above to create weighty songs that deal with both joy and sadness. Beginning with the eight-and-a-half-minute title track, Orton’s craggy vocals are front and center for the record’s duration. “I’m invincible as grief / Violent as a blade of spring released / Ecstatic as a mother’s love / Tearing through the ground to the sky above,” Orton sings, voice perched on the precipice.
Most of The Ground Above’s eight tracks are moody growers where only multiple, deep listens can separate their bounties. Only on the penultimate track, “Love You Right,” does Orton allow her voice to soar. In many ways, it feels like a more appropriate ending to the record than “Otherside,” where Orton sings, “Go and sing out for your freedom / Sing out for your life / Sing out for another day / You get to make it right.” This may feel a bit too much of a pat summation, especially with the better song preceding it.
Orton is more successful in other songs such as standout “Waiting.” Leaning on Christos Stylianides’ tasteful trumpet and Jesse Chandler’s flute, the song finds the singer not waiting idly for life to pass by. Meanwhile, the gentle “Before I Knew,” a song the musician said is about “beliefs so deeply ingrained it’s unclear where they arose from,” feels as fragile as Orton’s brittle voice.
Like Orton’s prior work, The Ground Above traverses some tricky emotional terrain. It’s a record best suited for a chill autumn evening rather than the full-throated warmth of summer. But that shouldn’t stop you from buying it. Spin it now, let it mellow, and when you return to The Ground Above as summer comes to a close, Orton will still be there to embrace you.
Source: Beth Orton Demands Your Attention on ‘The Ground Above’ – SPIN