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There's every chance that Laura Marling will get lost in the shuffle as the unexpected commercial success of Feist's The Reminder leads major labels to unleash hordes of similarly talented female singer/songwriters, but Alas I Cannot Swim is far better than the average coffee house-endorsed girly pop.
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Where Adele sounds like a method actor, Marling weaves secretive threads of thought that suggest she’s agonised over things long enough for them to come together with a thud in plain-spoken full stops.
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Her songs are similarly sparse and fragile, with some astonishingly mature lyrics framed by beautifully pretty melodies.
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Marling's voice, rich and tenuous, recalls Joni Mitchell, but her fatalistic screeds--sung over acoustic guitar, with an occasional burst of percussion or strings--owe more to Nick Drake and Will Oldham.
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The unnervingly grown-up Alas I Cannot Swim is the result, and if it doesn't install her as the heir to the likes of Devendra Banhart, there's no hope for folk-pop.
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Her creamy voice canters over deft fingerpicked guitars and celtic violin throughout the rest of the album, and although the heights of the aforementioned song are barely hinted at elsewhere, Marling’s promise--she’s just 17 years old--is as clear as spring water.
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Under The RadarAlas, I Cannot Swim is an awe-inspiring debut by an old soul on a mission to inject some much needed legitimacy into the singer/songwriting tradition. [Fall 2008, p.81]
User score distribution:
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Positive: 31 out of 32
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Mixed: 1 out of 32
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Negative: 0 out of 32
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Jan 14, 2017
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Sep 16, 2011