Lisa Germano: Slide

The brightest talents often come from the oddest places. Lisa Germano was John Mellencamp's violin player, but some disastrous relationships and the onset of depression caused her to reassess her career. Taking some time off from playing with the hero of the heartland, Germano discovered the therapeutic nature of home recording. By the time she released her second album, Happiness, it was clear that Germano was a powerful force. Her melancholy and sometimes painfully honest songwriting mines the darkest depths of despair, and her albums often hang like eerie self-portraits. Whether or not Germano is as bad off as she sounds on Geek The Girl or last year's masterpiece Excerpts From A Love Circus—an assumption encouraged as much by her strained singing as by her harrowing lyrics—is irrelevant. Happy, sad, funny, serious, Germano is everything Tori Amos strives to be and then some. That's initially part of the problem with her fifth album, Slide. Producer Tchad Blake brought along his bag of studio tricks and session men, which sometimes conflicts with Germano's distinct personality. Luckily, though, she keeps Blake in check, and his quirks and her quirks ultimately intertwine as one. Slide may be Germano's most accessible disc to date, with "Way Below The Radio" and "Crash" sounding traditional enough to appeal to both the NPR crowd and gloomy alt-rockers. But equally strong are spare ballads like the title track, "Guillotine," and "Wood Floors," as well as weird ditties like "Turning Into Betty" and "Reptile," whose odd arrangements belie their tunefulness. Slide is another great work from a unique songwriter, and if it never attains the heights of its predecessor, it's still a wonderful album.