I’ve listened to Avril’s new album Under My Skin, so time now to take on Alanis’ latest which is titled So-Called Chaos. Not with the aim in view of making comparisons but to check out how Alanis has progressed in her roller coaster ride to maturity as a person and particularly as a musician. This after all, is her fourth studio album and she has chronicled her journey over the years in the contents of Jagged Little Pill, Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie and Under Rug Swept. We now go to the next chapter.
The same thing so noticeable in Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie and Under Rug Swept is once more present in So-Called Chaos. Alanis is still trying to recapture the dysfunctional persona that enchanted listeners in Jagged Little Pill. That was a bit possible in Junkie but change is inevitable in everything and it has been nine years since. What held true for Alanis in 1995 is vastly different now. Despite the at times unwieldy lyrics, the first cut Eight Easy Steps hews closely to the exuberant confusion of the first album. Then Alanis tries to toe the same direction but her music is taking her somewhere else.
Truth to tell, there is an almost happy note in the contents of So-Called Chaos. A smiling Alanis is on the cover. There is nothing like the angry but Grammy-winning You Oughta Know here. I hear chimes, lots of guitars, even a sitar in the arrangements. She has a song titled unbelievably so, Knees of My Bees, which is a love song so playful, it might end up a nursery rhyme. " You make the knees of my bees weak/ tremble and buckle/ you make the knees of my bees weak." She tries to conjure up the loner from before with Excuses, "Why no one will help me I’m too dumb I’m too smart/ they’ll not understand me I’m lonely they’ll hate me" but it falls flat.
What works better this time around is Out is Through, which is decidedly upbeat: "Every time you raise your voice I see the greener grass/ every time you run for cover I see this pasture/ every time we’re in a funk I picture a different choice/ anytime we’re in a rut this distant grandeur/ my tendency to want to do away feels natural and/ my urgency to dream of softer places feels understandable…."
I know that this kind of writing is not going to go well with those who found a kindred soul in the songs of early Alanis but there is no bucking change. I do not think Alanis should fight it either. She should enjoy the optimism, bask even in its light. I know that happy pop may not be as interesting as her dark musings from long ago but it is kinder on the nerves. As she says in Everything, her song of acceptance and the first single release: "I can be an asshole of the grandest kind/ I can withhold like it’s going out of style/ I can be the moodiest baby and you’ve never met anyone/ who is as negative as I am sometimes….you see everything you see every part/ you see all my light and you love my dark/ you dig everything of which I’m ashamed/ there’s not anything to which you can’t relate/ and you’re still there…"
Now if you really find that tone unacceptable, do remember that Alanis has other things to offer aside from her disturbing "confessions." She has tremendous songwriting skills. Every song just seems to flow like a waterfall from her insides in every album. She is also an exceptionally gifted vocalist. Great voice. Great flair for drama. And all of these are present in So-Called Chaos.
The Grammys might stay away from Alanis this time but we should all feel glad at finding another happy soul.