Martha’s new album follows Wainwright musical tradition

If ever a contemporary musical family could be called a dynasty, the Wainwrights would be it. In her self-titled debut album, Martha Wainwright follows in the footsteps of her famous family: father Loudon Wainwright III, whose much-lauded folk music career has spanned three decades and over 20 albums; mother, Kate, and aunt Anna, McGarrigle, famous French-Canadian folk singers; and brother Rufus Wainwright, who drew a large and enthusiastic crowd when he performed at Vassar in February, 2004. In her first full-length album released April 12, Martha proves she can live up to the family reputation for both vocal and lyrical expression.

While her brother Rufus is known for his elaborately orchestrated and complex songs, Martha sticks closely to her parents’ tradition of folk music with this acoustic album. While her folksy feel invites comparisons to Dar Williams and her piano ballads venture into Tori Amos territory, Martha Wainwright is sparsely accompanied, and perhaps somewhat less creative in this simplicity.

The longing “Far Away” opens the album nicely, introducing the listener to Wainwright’s distinct and moving voice—a combination of childish qualities and mature emotional delivery. As she slides expertly and evocatively from note to note, she sounds like a mix between her brother, Rufus, and Jenny Lewis of Rilo Kiley. Martha’s voice has all of the expressiveness, range, and uniqueness of her brother’s, but it is more accessible and easier to understand. Wainwright’s masterful vocal delivery is also highlighted in the plaintive “Factory,” which has a mellow melancholy that few other performers could convey so convincingly.

While Martha’s songwriting can occasionally be vague or trite, her singing and writing both reach their peak in “B.M.F.A.” (that is, “Bloody Mother F-----g A--hole”). With such an uncompromisingly bitter title, the song seems destined for a future as a break-up ballad for the Dar Williams crowd, though actually composed about her often-absent father. She sounds both movingly accusatory and exultantly liberated in insisting, “I will not put on a smile/I will not say I'm all right for you/whoever you are,” and then unabashedly crowing the song’s title. “B.M.F.A.” is one of the most enjoyable songs on the album, perhaps due to the touch of humor in its complaint.

Humor is something Martha Wainwright should learn to use more to contribute both to the complexity of her lyricism and the variety of her all-too-despondent tracks. Her lyrics occasionally lack nuance or originality, reading more like the Deadjournal poetry of an angst-ridden adolescent, with wince-worthy lines like, “Fall down into the ground/Deep down/Far as you can,” or “Why does this always happen?/Oh why does this always happen?/Why?/Why?”

Though a few songs stand out, they all begin to blend together. Wainwright’s warbling can occasionally be a little too much of a good thing, and the album feels longer than its 50 minutes. One hopes that Wainwright will push herself to new limits of creativity and variety in future albums.

—Margaret Files, Staff Writer