Natalie Imbruglia - Left of the Middle Review

Natalie Imbruglia Left of the Middle

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Tracklist:
1. Torn
2. One More Addiction
3. Big Mistake
4. Leave Me Alone
5. Wishing I Was There
6. Smoke
7. Pigeons and Crumbs
8. Don't You Think?
9. Impressed
10. Intuition
11. City
12. Left of the Middle

Ranking: #115 for 1998

user rating

3.4
great

Chart.

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2.5
average

Jom STAFF (70 Reviews)

2006-05-26 | 8 comments | 824 views

Summary: A fair debut that sports a number of excellent tracks, but the album is ultimately weighed down by a number of uninspiring songs or tracks where Natalie tries too hard to emulate other artists, as if she doesn't trust her own voice.

The mainstream pop craze in the late 1990s revolved around female singer-songwriters. Artists like Sheryl Crow, the young Jewel, the angsty Alanis Morissette, and Paula Cole asking "Where have all the cowboys gone?" were consistent mainstays on the radio across the world. One artist who also shared radio play is the Australian-born Natalie Imbruglia. Natalie was first known for her acting, particularly in the Australian soap opera Neighbours, but she packed her luggage and booked it to England to try her luck as a recording artist. As luck would have it, she was signed almost instantly by RCA. Left of the Middle marks Natalie's debut effort, and it's quite a mixed bag in terms of what you'll find in this dozen-track arrangement. The album was wildly successful in her home country, Europe, and in the United States due to the pre-record release of Torn, a cover of Ednaswap's original version, by turning it into a chord-driven, sauntering tempo of a song. There are some hidden gems, such as Wishing I Was There and Intuition, but the album suffers for two major reasons: 1) the homogeneous nature of the album, and 2) Natalie being pushed down in the mix, even though she has a weaker voice. While Natalie did play a significant role in the songwriting process, co-writing every single song save for a couple, her efforts when compared with the other female singer-songwriters of this time period do not stand out significantly, and the success of this album is due mainly to the wild popularity of Torn.

On the album, Natalie attempts to run the gamut of emotions in her own individual style, although it is obvious that she is drawing from the influences of her peers. In terms of frustration and pent-up anger, there isn't a better representation of a copycat Alanis Morissette, and Natalie attempts to emulate her in tracks such as One More Addiction and especially Intuition. Another emotion Natalie sings about is the sense of longing for a lover. This is essentially the main focus of her writing; she trashes old lovers, but can never seem to find the ideal mate, always succumbing to a lover who is unsatisfactory to her wants and needs, at best. In terms of production, the album is definitely acceptable by pop standards: everything is mixed well. And if there is one little detail that could distance Natalie from the rest of the crop of female singer/songwriters, it would be her experimentation and use of electronic soundbytes, especially in the album's second single, Smoke. The album was produced for the most part by Phil Thornalley, a name best associated with The Cure, and was mixed by Nigel Godrich, famous for his work with Radiohead.

In short, Natalie's debut is a fair one. There are a number of excellent tracks, but the album is weighed down by a number of uninspiring songs or tracks where Natalie tries too hard to emulate other artists, almost as if she feels that she doesn't trust her own voice.

Torn is the album opener, starting off with an acoustic strum pattern and Natalie's voice entering shortly afterwards. Her Australian/British accent is quite palpable here, and it seemingly adds an extra dimension to her voice. Throughout the verses, she sings very softly, and she never really seems to want to project. As the song progresses and the lyrics become more desperate, Natalie does a swell job in matching the anxiety through her voice. The bass is rather groovy for a pop song, and the percussion is standard fare. The bridge is a short vocal ad-lib, and she returns to her chorus, beginning with the familiar "I'm all out of faith, this is how I feel: I'm cold and I am shamed lying naked on the floor," and later following up with "I'm wide awake and I can see the perfect sky is torn." An instrumental outro at 3:29 is then featured, with Natalie crooning in the background over the electric and acoustic guitars.

One More Addiction starts off with some drum-n-bass, and the electronic influence becomes palpable after the verses. Her voice changes somewhat in dynamic, and she attempts to emulate Alanis' trademark "mouthy" vocal crescendo over the electronic beat. Bass, harmonica, and fingerpicked guitar feature in the bridge, where she babbles about her fear of commitment: "It's you, I bet I won't forget, maybe I'm not ready yet." The song ends with bass guitar and the electronic drums, and she dismisses the suitor as a memory.

Big Mistake is another somewhat-Alanis rip-off, especially in the chorus. Bass guitar drives the intro and an effect-laden guitar. In the opening verse, she sings as if in conversation, and it builds to a crecendo to the chorus, which, again, is very Alanis-esque: "And you're down on your knees - it's too late, oh, don't come crawlin', and you lie by my feet - what a big mistake, I see you fallin'." The wispy instruments and Natalie's soft-spoken voice in the verses retard the tempo somewhat, but the crescendo to the chorus kicks the song back into gear. The bridge has a similar feel to the chorus, with Natalie's voice resonating reasonably well in the bridge and repeated choruses, and the song ends with a slow instrumental decrescendo.

Leave Me Alone highlights Natalie's frustration with her lover refusing "to hold" and "to love" her. The overall mood of the song is bubbly and Natalie's voice is very faint, weaving in and out of each channel. Lyrically, the song is basically empty, save for her repeating "Just leave me alone" over bass, strings, and piano. The song drags for quite too long and is unfortunately too slow. Finally, she declares that she's "walking out of the door"and that she'll "make it on [her] own." Monotonous and uninspiring are two appropriate adjectives to describe this track. However, Wishing I Was There injects the album back to life with a guitar slide and another effect-laden guitar intro. Natalie's voice is again very soft, but she fluctuates to-and-fro over and underneath the rich bass. Natalie does a swell job crescendoing in the chorus, pleading, "Don't say you love me, don't say you need me, I really don't think that's fair - boy, I'm not so dumb, but when you leave me, I'll be wishing I, wishing I, wishing I was there with you." In the verses, she sings very quickly to match the beat, and the pre-chorus and chorus features her singing and taking control of her upper register. Her upper register isn't very high to begin with, but she controls her voice well, especially when the vocals are dubbed in both channels. The song lasts a few moments longer with the chorus being repeated a few times with different instrumentation - the bridge drops off in volume - but the chorus is instrumentally-driven and coalesces with Natalie's vocals extremely well. The song ends with the typical decrescendo. One of the best songs on the album.

Smoke, as mentioned before, is electronically-driven, but the addition of piano helps bolster the song. Without the piano, the song would collapse due to Natalie's vocals being too far down in the mix in the verses. Strangely, however, her vocals are moved up in the mix for the choruses, and it's a wonderful improvement, Delicate and seemingly fragile, she croons that "bleeding is breathing" and that "bleeding is believing." The most notable part of the song is how her voice melts in between each aspect of the track. As she sustains a note, the mixer "melts" her voice into the next part of the song, making each progression extremely fluid. Another highlight of the song is the bridge, where it's just Natalie and piano at about 2:40. The guitars are layered in gradually, and the song follows the similar formula of repeated choruses with a decrescendo and an instrumental outro. Again, the piano is excellent, and the incorporation of strings in the outro adds to the beauty of the track.

Pigeons and Crumbs could be described as a pop ballad, clocking in at over five minutes and with another andante tempo. Natalie's vocals are again a slow, somber croon, and at times indecipherable in the verses. Once again, her vocals seem to emerge powerfully in the prechoruses and choruses, in which she concludes by stating, "Don't believe a thing they say today - seems we all get lost amongst the pigeons and the crumbs." There is an instrumental bridge with a short, twangy guitar solo, and Natalie enters just before the 4:00 mark. Again, the song follows the same outro formula.

Don't You Think starts off with groovy bass and Natalie sounding like a robot underneath the pulsing bass. This track is another Alanis-like rip, but the bass and guitars push Natalie's voice again. The highlight of this song is the almost purely-electronic bridge, where Natalie travels between the two channels with the bass gradually moving her vocals along. Save for a methodical to-and-fro tempo mannerism, this is another Alanis-esque track, in which Natalie comes across as biting and to-the-point, namely when she counters with, "Hear a bell ring, sex sells everything, but I don't buy it so don't try it... ignore reality, there's nothing you can do about it." The song oscillates between poppy energy - the positive - and slow, brooding music - a negative. Had the poppy energy been sustained throughout the track, this would be a highlight; unfortunately, it's only sporadically done. As usual, the same outro formula applies. Impressed is another electronic-driven track. Natalie's vocals are finally high in the mix, but again, it's only found in the prechorus and chorus. Fortunately, the bass and electronic drum-and-bass push Natalie's vocals along. Throughout the song, Natalie refers to people changing their attire and their physical look to conform to society's ideals by "stealing your look from a magazine, playing the part from a movie scene." Somehow, for some reason, Natalie is impressed by all this throughout the entire song, as she ad-libs in the outro over the bass, electronic drum-and-bass, and the different guitars.

Intuition begins with Natalie's frustrations coming to the forefront right away, remarking that "Everybody's been in my face, tellin' me I gotta make a change, all I ever hear day and night is 'You better hurry up and get a life.'" Fortunately, frustration brings energy, which is again a highlight. The song becomes even more pop-intense in the chorus, in which Natalie sings, "Intuition tells me how to live my day, intuition tells me when to walk away - could have turned left, could have turned right - but I ended up here, bang! in the middle of real life."

Natalie accents each line, especially the "Bang!" at the end. The song is structured and sounds dangerously close to a popular Shania Twain track, but Natalie's voice is heterogeneous and individual for one of the rare instances in this album. This track is also hands-down the most energetic track and would have been an excellent choice for a single for radio play. Another stellar track, and clearly the album's hidden gem.

City is surprisingly country-driven with some blues influences. There is a saxophone to compliment Natalie's voice, coupled with the guitars and percussion. Vocally, Natalie is strong once more, singing about finding strength away "from this place," escaping to the country, and methodically repeating "I wanna start again" over and over. The guitars and percussion drive the bridge and outro. At 3:30, the outro begins, and it's an instrumental display from her support band. There are some short lead parts and electric guitar solos intertwined within the outro, and the song decrescendos in typical fashion. Left of the Middle begins with Natalie crooning softly along with an acoustic guitar, inquiring where her "hero" is when she's "pushing zero." Reminiscent of Sheryl Crow, Natalie's voice rings out well in the choruses, but she again disappears in the verses with the acoustic. Fortunately, the chorus is repeated many times, so Natalie's voice shines here and in the introduction. Natalie concludes the track - and the album - by saying that "It's not always easy left of the middle."

Overall, this album is a fair debut for the Aussie-born Natalie. Her cover of "Torn" is well-executed with the right amount of pop-engineering from Thornalley. The biggest flaw in this album is Natalie being pushed way too low in the mix on an unforgivable number of occasions, especially in the verses. She does not have as strong of a voice as Alanis Morissette or Paula Cole do, and by being pushed down in the mix, her voice sounds fragile and lost under the instruments. However, the choruses are almost always the highlights of the songs because one can actually hear her voice. Again, she does not exhibit a wide range, but her voice rarely wavers. As a whole, the album suffers for these reasons.

Even still, there are some hidden gems on the album, which overall sounds very chill, with an unfortunate lack of universal energy. Natalie's best songs are her most energetic: due to her having a weaker voice in comparison to the other female artists during this time, she needed to have more songs like that to stand out, as the ballad-esque tracks did not exemplify her best work. And while the topics she covers throughout her album are diverse, she never quite sets herself apart from the rest of her colleagues. To her credit, though, she's extremely beautiful, and her voice could be so much better if she was just pushed up more in the mix.

C

Jom recommends:

Intuition
Wishing I Was There
Smoke
Torn

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