Fat-Cat Rec.
Nina Nastasia & Jim White : You Follow Me (UK,2007)****
It is always a pleasure to hear a new album by Nina Nastasia. The gifted percussion (by Jim White, also known from Dirty Three,..), with guitar and voice only, has a lot to tell. This is more than once with more variations of stories and themes within just one song. This is not such a release of someone unprepared in creating songs. The combination of both artists uplifts the individual quality. Only a shame I don’t have the lyrics available for reading. I can only say that the songs give the impression of twice thought over experiences. Jim White’s percussion is not always obvious in it’s rhythmically playfulness, which makes the music more surprising, fresh and moving. A fine album.
Fat-Cat Rec.Nina Nastasia : What She Doesn't Know / Your Red Nose -single- (UK,2008)***°
During the sessions of Nina Nastasia’s last album with Jim White on drums, she wrote and recorded some other songs that were originally supposed to be ideas for a next album, but in the end Nina found that these two songs (of which one was recorded with her own drummer Jay Bellerose), still fitted well as complimentary tracks to the previous album, so here they are published as a limited vinyl single of 500 copies with a comparable cover to remind us to which album this fits.
“What she doesn’t know” is a consciously sung quiet song with guitar, a simple but powerful song, as a dramatic statement in a love affair, saying “what she doesn’t know couldn’t hurt her anyway”. “Your Red Nose” has the recognisable brushed drumming of Jim White, is a short, a bit more sober song around the same subject.
