Sold Date: August 10, 2015
Start Date: March 29, 2013
Final Price: $21.99 (USD)
Seller Feedback: 10379
Buyer Feedback: 11

ARTIST: Nico
TITLE: Desertshore
FORMAT: LP
LABEL: 4 Men With Beards
CATALOG #: 4M-113

RECORD CONDITION: NEW
JACKET CONDITION: NEW

DESCRIPTION: review by Mark Deming allmusic

While was the member of who had had the least experience in music prior to joining the group (while she had recorded a pop single in England, she'd never been a member of a working band before introduced her to ), she was also the one who strayed farthest from traditional rock & roll after her brief tenure with the band, and by the time she recorded Desertshore, her work had little (if anything) to do with traditional Western pop. , who produced and arranged Desertshore, once described the music as having more to do with 20th century classical music than anything else, and while that may be going a bit far to make a point, even compared to the avant-rock frenzy of 's early material, Desertshore is challenging stuff. 's dour Teutonic monotone is a compelling but hardly welcoming vocal presence, and the songs, centered around the steady drone of her harmonium, are often grim meditations on fate that are crafted and performed with inarguable skill and intelligence, but are also a bit samey, and the album's downbeat tone gets to be rough sledding by the end of side two. 's arrangements are superb throughout, and "My Only Child," "Afraid," and "The Falconer" are quite beautiful in their own ascetic way, but like the bulk of 's repertoire, Desertshore is an album practically designed to polarize its listeners; you'll either embrace it's darkness or give up on it before the end of side one. Then again, given the thoroughly uncompromising nature of her career as a musician, that's probably just what had in mind. 


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