Diana Krall - Girl in the Other Room (CD)

All Music Guide

While the jazz fascists (read: purists) may be screaming "sellout" because Diana Krall decided to record something other than standards this time out, the rest of us can enjoy the considerable fruit of her labors. The Girl In the Other Room is, without question, a jazz record in the same manner her other outings are. The fact that it isn't made up of musty and dusty "classics," may irk the narrowminded and reactionary, but it doesn't change the fact that this bold recording is a jazz record made with care, creativity, and a wonderfully intimate aesthetic fueling its 12 songs. Produced by Tommy LiPuma and Ms. Krall, the nonoriginal material ranges from the Mississippifueled jazzed up blues of Mose Allison's Stop This World," to contemporary songs that are reinvented in Ms. Krall's image by Tom Wait (Temptation"), Joni Mitchell ("Black Crow"), Chris Smither ("Love Me Like A Man") and her husband Elvis Costello ("Almost Blue"). These covers are striking. Ms. Krall's read of Allison's tune... rivals his and adds an entirely different shade of meaning, as does her swinging, jazzy RB infused take on Smither's sexy nugget via its first hitmaker Bonnie Raitt. Her interpretation of Waits' "Temptation is far more sultry than Holly Cole's because Ms. Krall understands this pop song to be a jazz tune rather than a jazzy pop song. "Black Crow," exists in its own space in the terrain of the album, because Krall understands that jazz is not mere articulation but interpretation. Likewise her reverent version of Costello's "Almost Blue" takes its out of its original countrypolitain setting and brings it back to the blues.As wonderful as these songs are, however, they serve a utilitarian purpose; they act as bridges to the startling, emotionally charged poetics in the material Krall has composed with Costello Totalling half the album, this material is full of grief, darkness and a tentative reemergence from the shadows. It begins in the noirish melancholy of the title track, kissed with bittersweet agony by Gershwin's "Summertime." The grain in Krall's pained voice relates an edgy third person tale that is harrowing in its lack of revelation and in the way it confounds the listener; it features Josh Clayton on bass and Jeff Hamilton on drums. In "I've Changed My Address," Ms. Krall evokes the voices ghosts such Louis Armstrong and Anita O'Day in a sturdy hip vernacular that channels the early beat jazz of Waits and Allison. The lyric is solid, wonderfully evocative not only of time and place, but of emotional terrain. Ms. Krall's solo in the tune is stunning. "Narrow Daylight," graced by gospel overtones is a tentative step into hope with its opening line: "Narrow daylight enters the room, winter is over, summer is near." This glimmer of hope is shortlived, however, as "Abandoned Masquerade" reveals the shattered promise in the aftermath of dying love. "I'm Coming Through," and "Departure Bay" that close the set are both underscored by the grief experienced at the loss of Krall's mother. They are far from sentimental, nor are they sophomoric; but they express through the eloquence of Krall's wonderfully sophisticated melodic architecture and rhythmic parlance, the experience of longing, of death, and of acceptance. The former features a beautiful solo by guitarist Wilson and the latter, in its starkness offers memory as reflection and instruction. Read more Less