- Tracey Thorn kept it simple—extremely simple—on her 2010 album Love and Its Opposite, which found the Everything but the Girl chanteuse making her way through songs about aging and changing, among many other attendant things. The title track here, from the album, is typical, with Thorn singing over electric guitar decorated with nothing more than just a little bit of reverb. (Those expecting producer Ewan Pearson to dial in some of his many studio tricks stand to be surprised by the sparseness he employs here.) In a similar but slightly more expansive mode, "Sister Winter" pairs Thorn's forlorn voice to a cover of a song by indie-folkie Sufjan Stevens—about Christmas! It's beautiful and flooringly powerful, though how much a song with actual jingle bells in it stands to rate as a summer jam remains to be seen.
The ostensible takeaway here, a remix of "You are a Lover" by Clock Opera, winds up falling flat in comparison. Its mix of tinkling piano, a sinuous bass-guitar groove, and lightly thwacking house drums proves capable enough, but it's gangly and awkward in places too—a sort of forced expansion of a song that didn't seem to call for it from the start.
Tracklist A1 You Are A Lover (Clock Opera Remix)
B1 You Are A Lover
B2 Sister Winter