Tulip Frenzy

In the cover photo, she looks like a penitent entering the convent, not so much Mariette In Ecstasy as Ophelia showing up at the nunnery, startled by her fate.  Musically, it sounds like Chan Marshall was given a church key not to open bottles but to move her musical operation to an abandoned cathedral where, without benefit of any altar boys, she was the lone congregant and celebrator of the mass.  Sun is at once a minimalist masterpiece and a remarkably deep pop album, showing what a single woman can do with a drum machine, piano, some synths, and an almost infinite number of tracks on which she can project her voice.  In fact, her voice is as multilayered as Jimi’s guitar was on First Rays Of The New Rising Sun, another album that pays its respect to morning and the renewal that comes when that yellow orb warms us, canceling the night.  Far from her days deconstructing “Satisfaction,” and only distantly indicative of the Memphis soul she laid down on The Greatest, Marshall has produced her finest work, an album that suggests a marriage between David Bowie and Beth Orton.  With the exception of Iggy Pop showing up in wonderful form on “Nothin But Time,” which sounds like “Heroes” at half speed, Marshall’s wizardry producing an album all by her lonesome sure would make Ty Segall and Tim Presley anxious to induct her to their treehouse club.  For once, all the hype over Cat Power is on the money, and Chan Marshall has a triumph to celebrate.