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| Listen to Loving You by Richelle Claiborn with Andy Rowland on alto sax: |
There is something to be said for conviction, that lock-jawed, tooth-grinding determination to not simply say something, but to, you know, mean it. A million musicians may play the same three-chord tune and rhyme the same stock romantic phrases (“heart” and “apart”; “forever” and “together”); a million poets may use the same images that even Chaucer found played out. But give me a sloppy guitarist that bashes his instrument with some vigor or a poet who delivers lines so hard I can hear her spit spattering the microphone—the violent expenditure of energy—and I am a bit more likely to pay attention.
 Charlottesville actress/musician/poet Richelle Claiborne offers some well-wrapped gifts on her new record, Say Something. |
“I tried to mortgage my mind for a down payment on success/ since everyone claims I’m so fucking clever,” barks Richelle Claiborne, erstwhile Charlottesville actress/musician/poet, on the opening track of her new record, Say Something. But, as she’ll tell you repeatedly, using the title of the track, she is “Denied. Deeee-nied. Red-stamped across my forehead.”
Claiborne is nothing if not honest; she certainly isn’t saying nothing, but the gal knows that her melodic and lyrical territories are more than simply well-worn—they’re paved and crowded with the likes of modern soul music updates like Amy Winehouse, not to mention every female writer that has ever referred to herself as “empowered.” But the beauty of Claiborne’s music is found in the presentation and delivery rather than the substance itself, the wrapping paper more interesting than the gift.
A few of Claiborne’s regular performance pieces—“Kelechi’s Song” and the self-affirming “Change”—find new lives over arrangements by guitarist Andy Waldeck, especially the latter, in which Claiborne promises herself that her change is on its way over punchy cymbals and a walking bass line: “It’s coming from a place where grandma used to press my hair,/ where Wonder Woman Underoos were my favorite underwear.” On “23,” Claiborne swishes the age of a younger lover around her mouth then spits out brilliant lines about her own age (“Flip his age around and I’m still older, but he don’t care/ He gets off on a few grey hairs”) as Waldeck employs wah-wah effects on his guitar that are as synonymous with sex as the singer’s voice.
Rippin’ Rich’s songs are nearly the equal of her jaw-snapping poems, each an attempt to try a new voice besides her usual, auditory ass-kicking bark. “Bring Me Down” is James Brown funk with backing vocals straight from En Vogue; “Loving You” matches Claiborne’s more delicate tones with Ezra Hamilton’s lounge keyboards, then lets her pop alongside a gleaming alto sax solo by Andy Rowland.
The album’s highlight, “The Only Poet,” casts Claiborne as an enraged emcee commanding a whirling rock ’n’ roll storm, and lingers as the album’s stand-out track. From a mess of distorted guitars, Claiborne barks, “I am a soul sister/ but I’m not the sole sister surviving shit,/ so I can’t be the only poet.” True. But she’s the only poet from our town to ever sound quite like this.
To read more about Richelle Claiborne, see Curtain Calls.
