Reviewed by Ian Phillips.
By Angel Olsen, Jagjaguwar 2021.
Angel Olsen hails from Asheville, North Carolina USA and Aisles is the first music of hers that I’ve heard.
This five-track EP is a series of interesting covers of songs that made a showing in the charts, often without becoming a hit.
The sorts of songs that you know but you’re not sure who did the originals.
The opening track, Gloria, is the best known of the lot, it’s not the ‘60s rocker from Them but Laura Branigan’s major hit from 1982.
Angel Olsen’s version slows the song down to about half the pace and in doing so she finally brings a deep pathos to the lyrics that Laura Branigan’s dance version completely missed.
Eyes Without A Face is a little-known Billy Idol song, Angel’s cover does a similar thing for this song.
She gives Eyes Without A Face a dreaminess or otherworldliness that I happily got lost in.
I went back to the original and I definitely prefer Angel’s version.
Safety Dance is a song by Men Without Hats, the melody was familiar but I just couldn’t pin it down until I looked it up.
Once again, it’s the inspired interpretation that transforms the song into something much greater than the original.
Orchestral Manoeuvres in The Dark’s song If You Leave, was quite a big hit when it came out although it had little impact on me.
That is, until I listened to Angel Olsen’s version which moves the song into an entirely different realm.
The final track is Forever Young from Alphaville, as soon as I saw the song title I was expecting the Dylan song of the same name instead I got a series of opening synthetized chords that once again had a vaguely familiar feel.
I went back to the original and Ms Olsen is quite faithful to the melody but the musical backdrop is entirely different which makes the song far more interesting than the original version.
I have to say that I’m impressed with Angel Olsen and Aisles is a good introduction to her work.
