Knives Don't Have Your Back

What the Soft Skeleton lacks is that sassy power Haines embodies with Metric.

The songs are emotive, and yet have catchy hooks; they are at times unrestrained and at others, calculated.

The lows are low for sure, but the highs are largely absent.

etric's clunky riffage and hi-hat beats are replaced by simple piano figures and subtle adornments (strings, feedback, breathing organ) that draw out Haines' most stirring vocal performances to date, and the muted milieu highlights her natural, sensuous whisper, lending a sympathetic thrust to these broken-down anthems for a thirtysomething girl.

A lap or two behind many of the albums it seemingly aspires to be (Cat Power, Radiohead, Fiona Apple and Elliott Smith comparisons have been made before and seem almost invited) 'Knives...' still has enough personality and original thought to shield it from accusations of simple derivation.

With such sparse instrumentation, these songs are still thick; there may not be a beat here to dance to but there is a lot to grab on to certainly.

She may not excel on her solo album the way she has with Broken Social Scene or Metric, but it's still a rainy-day listen.

Knives Don't Have Your Back is a striking contrast--and a poignant, subtle companion--to last year's Live It Out.

Mostly frustrating... the spare instrumentation and samey melodies wear you down. [Oct 2006, p.96]

Knives is a quietly simmering LP.

The results unfold like a well-plotted novel.

Emily Haines' breathy voice lacks range and sometimes character.

Essentially, Haines' piano playing and singing are lovely, but Knives' timidity, coupled with mundane and occasionally outright bad lyrics, keep this record in check.

Haines... is shaping up as the most impressive writer of the current wave of Canadian indie. [Jul 2007, p.103]

A lovely record. [Summer 2006]

Haines has... shown glimpses of a broken and beautiful solo artist just waiting to tell her story. This, my friends, is that breakout album in spades. [Oct 2006, p.122]