Sharon Van Etten: Are We There
In the music video for “Your Love Is Killing Me,” Sharon Van Etten paints a devastating portrait of unrequited love, one that ends with the same kind of quiet shock that has come to be a defining element of Van Etten’s music. As such, she has, over the course of four acclaimed albums, become one of our foremost documentarians of love and all its horrors (and, occasionally, its pleasures), a role she continues to inhabit on her most recent offering Are We There. Van Etten has grown increasingly more ambitious with each release, with “Are We There‘s” most startling growth manifesting itself in her preternatural confidence, one that previous releases hinted at but never quite fully realized. That degree of conviction renders Van Etten’s already powerful songwriting even more affecting, making “Are We There” a listening experience rare in both its vulnerability and its certainty, an experience not unlike the roller coaster relationships about which Van Etten so candidly sings.
The lyrics on Sharon Van Etten’s fourth album don’t always make for easy listening. “He can break me, with one hand,” she falsettos during one chorus, whereas Your Love Is Killing Me features broken legs, cut tongues and burned skin. As with her previous album “Tramp” these revelations feel intimate and shocking, and gain further power when Van Etten appears to fall back under her lover’s spell.”
If there’s one album this year that’s guaranteed to leave you emotionally devastated, it’s Sharon Van Etten’s Are We There. The singer-songwriter throws all her pain into her gorgeous fourth album, resulting in rousing musings on a crumbling relationship and the anguish of wondering whether it was all her fault. which mixed her folkier roots with more powerful dynamics, though here she branches out with synths and organs (see “Taking Chances” and “Our Love”). But the real soul-crusher comes with “Your Love Is Killing Me,” on which she repeats, “Burn my skin so I can’t feel you / Stab my eyes so I can’t see.” Despite all the pain and doubt, Van Etten sounds more confident than ever on Are We There, adding more strength to her vocals without sacrificing the delicate beauty that makes them so haunting. You might feel like a wreck after listening, but the roller coaster ride is worth the price of admission.
The Fat Angel Sings 