From Iran to Sweden and a Shaking England:  Women Rock
Posted by Jill Ettinger on March 31, 2011 at 8:00am

If it's good music you're after this spring, listen no further than these three incredible records by three incredibly unique women. While all are texturally different, there is an element of fearlessness consistent throughout all three. Azam Ali tackles conflict regions with fierce softness, PJ Harvey shakes up the UK with a predictable unpredictability, and Lykke Li scares off vampires with her haunting voice.

Azam Ali: From Night to the Edge of Day (Six Degrees Records)
Azam Ali's voice is one ears simply cannot ignore. She sings with a gentle intensity, a storied journey through her Iranian birth and years raised in India on her latest solo effort, From Night to the Edge of Day.

Inspired by the recent birth of her son, Ali turns again towards her homeland and dots a landscape known for anything but being gentle lately, but instead of conflict she pulls out excruciatingly gorgeous and tender lullabies from Iran, Turkey, Lebanon and Kurdish descent. Only a voice like Ali's can transcend such boundaries, and she demonstrates (like in past projects Vas, Niyaz) on tracks such as "Noor"and "Nami Nami" especially that a lullaby is never just a song. While motherhood certainly can lead us to an urgent longing for peace around the world, listeners will hear something deeper than that on From Night to the Edge of Day. Ali haunts and teaches while reminding us that there is greatness in music of all cultures just waiting to be shared.

PJ Harvey Let England Shake (Vagrant Records)
Radical departures are not happenstance when you're PJ Harvey. Let England Shake, her first album since 2007's White Chalk is once again nothing like you would expect her to be. And, indeed that is a most marvelous thing.

The album opens with an eerie Merry-go-round sounding sampling of "Istanbul (Not Constantinople)" (Kennedy/Simon) which ripples underneath Harvey's ghostly, Bjorkian vocals. At times the album sounds like an almost-throwback to 50's doo-wop, but then there are rich, strange interludes that defy definition like the incredible track, "The Glorious Land." Harvey sounds most herself here, if there is such a thing. Peculiar, perplexing, perfect on "In the Dark Places", the gritty guitar work tinges with Patti Smith's Easter-era emptiness. Call it Zen, maybe, indispensable, surely.

Comparisons to everyone from Kate Bush to Bob Dylan are certainly on point. Harvey's radically self-critical and capable of transforming insecurity and fear into something spectacular. If her sound is inconsistent, her greatness is anything but; she reinvents in ways that seems only cathartic and healthy, and those expecting her to gratuitously dole out seconds of previous records are missing the opportunity she's offering. Harvey prepares each record like a meal--each song a delicious bite made from scratch, carefully and humbly incapable of ever being created exactly the same way twice.

Lykke Li Wounded Rhymes (Atlantic Records)
If M.I.A. and Lady Gaga had a love child, her name would be Lykke Li. She'd have been born in Sweden, but never really lived there much, calling home no place in particular. She'd have a voice that makes her sound much older than she is, but in a good way. She'd write songs that are porous, incredibly simple and complicated at the same time. 

Wounded Rhymes is Li's sophomore release. Getting support from the "Twilight" series (Ask the nearest Tween what that is), Li defies the rigid label of pop music. Sounding like Stevie Nicks after a good cough drop, Li's voice is an instrument she's comfortable with using in a way that makes you think she's going to have a lot more fun with it over the years.

Li's advantage lies perhaps in her homelessness—her inherent lack of boundaries give way for bold attempts like she demonstrates in following the hardy and forceful "Rich Kid Blues" with the poppy "Sadness is a Blessing." And that leads into the raw and stunningly mature show-stopper, "I Know Places." Where music is going these days is anyone's guess. But with Li at the wheel, it's most surely going to be some place interesting, and some place definitely unexpected.