Ladie's Love Oracle [Bonus Track]
On his debut solo effort, Grant-Lee Phillips proclaims, "Sometimes a sketch says more than a mural." Although it would be a mistake to dismissLadies' Love Oracleas merely a collection of sketches, that idea helped inform this set of acoustic guitar-driven ballads. The material found here isn't so much sketches of songs as of the songwriter himself--pieces of the artist as he reinvents himself in the wake of an artistically and critically (if not commercially) successful career with his former group, Grant Lee Buffalo.Ladies' Love Oraclefinds the artist exploring unrequited love on "Lonesome Serenade" and perhaps reflecting on his place in the music world on "Nothing Is for Sure." The songs are fleshed out with simple arrangements on the harmonica, piano, and whatever other instruments Phillips seems to have picked up while recording in producer-musician Jon Brion's (Aimee Mann, Fiona Apple) basement studio. The result is an intimate view into the soul of a uniquely gifted singer-songwriter as he takes inventory of his life at a crossroads.--Michael Wells