Jane Siberry Albums (16)
'Shushan the Palace: Hymns of Earth'
Release Date 1/1/2003
Tracks 9
Label Sheeba Music Inc.
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What The Critics Say
This is Siberry's odds-and-sods album -- tracks that have appeared here and there, all gathered up and collected in one tidy package. The result is to show just how much of a true artist she is, continually taking chances and never standing still, whether it's on "My Mother Is Not the White Dove," with its curious mix of ney flute, flugelhorn, and strings, or "All the Pretty Little Ponies" from the soundtrack to Barney's Great Adventure. Throw in some work for director Wim Wenders and collaborations with the likes of Scots piper Michael Grey (where Siberry sings in Gaelic) or French sound-builder Hector Zazou, and you've got someone who doesn't believe in limits or boundaries. The highlights, however, have to be "Innig," which pairs her with classical violinist Nigel Kennedy, and the spacious "Spade and Sparrow," where she teams with Japanese songwriter/musician Takafumi Sotoma. It's a lot of ground to cover on one disc, really, but proof that some of these individual tracks have been more successful than some of her full-length album experiments. But she never stops going further and seeking the new, a sign of someone for whom the music is about art, not commerce. And God knows, listeners need all of those they can get. ~ Chris Nickson, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Jane Siberry has always had a very individual way of looking at music, and when she turns her gaze below the 49th parallel to the music of America, things get interesting. She brings her usual floating quality to a gospel tune like "Jacob's Ladder," and finds romance rather than tragedy in "Streets of Laredo." "False False Fly," whose origins are in British folk, gets a hip-hop beat, but for the most part, her takes are languid, letting the music and lyrics breathe, and finding new facets in the surrounding air. Pretty much without exception, the pieces are familiar, which lands her in dangerous territory -- such reinterpretation is messing with things people love. But for the first two-thirds of the record, it works like magic. For the last three tracks, however, the spell seems to fail. "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," "Ol' Man River," and a medley of "O Shenandoah" and "Sail Away" just don't have the gravity -- perhaps because two of them are better suited to the resonating depth of the male voice. Still, Siberry makes art out of history for most of the album, and a record like this truly does confirm that she's a real artist, with a unique take on the world, able to put everything through her own particular prism. So while it's not the most successful contemporary take on American roots music, it's still satisfying, and more than repays the time invested. ~ Chris Nickson, All Music Guide
'Tree: Music for Films and Forests'
Release Date 9/9/1999
Tracks 9
Label Sheeba
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What The Critics Say
In the autumn of 1996, Jane Siberry began a series of performances at New York City's The Bottom Line. Each of the three shows had a theme, and all three were recorded for future release. The last show of the trilogy, a Christmas show, was the first to be released (1997's Child), with the other two scheduled to follow. However, Siberry had started her own label, and there were some financial problems, plus some legal issues to work out with Warner Brothers, the label she was signed to at the time of the shows. Three years after the concerts, the remaining performances have finally been released. This disc has been released both individually and as part of an elaborate, beautifully packaged four-CD box set entitled New York Trilogy, and it is brilliant. The performances are well-recorded, and the band is tight, with Siberry providing her beautiful, angelic vocals. All the songs come off remarkably well in a live setting. The version of "It Can't Rain All the Time" far surpasses the studio version (found on the soundtrack of The Crow), and newer songs such as "Burning Ship" show that Siberry can still write thought-provoking songs with incredible melodies. This album was well worth the wait, and is something that both the fanatic and casual fan will enjoy. ~ Aaron Badgley, All Music Guide
'Lips: Music For Saying It'
Release Date 9/9/1999
Tracks 14
Label Sheeba
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What The Critics Say
Lips was the second of Jane Siberry's trilogy of concerts held monthly in New York City's Bottom Line Club in 1996. Due to financial problems and legal issues with her then-label Warner Brothers, this CD was released almost three years after the concert. The CD is available by itself or as part of the elaborate, beautifully packaged New York Trilogy, which also includes Tree and the previously issued Child (although it was the last of the three concerts, Child was the first to be issued, as a double CD in 1997 through Sheeba). This particular recording is brilliant in its oddness. Siberry is a bit unconventional with the live recording, as some of the songs just cut off, rather than cross-fading or even fading. This has a jarring effect and serves as a reminder that one is listening to a recording, rather than a concert. The songs are a mix of new and old (including cover versions of "Valley of the Dolls" and "I Will Survive"), all based around the theme of being able to express oneself before it is too late. Siberry also wrote her own reply to her famous "Mimi on the Beach" in the form of the song "Mimi Finally Speaks"; it's both funny and sad (Mimi isn't even her real name!), which basically sums up this CD, as truly funny moments like "Hotel Room 417" alternate with moving pieces like "Grace Hospital." This CD is a unique experience, due to the subject matter and the manner in which the songs are performed; there isn't a single dull moment to be had. ~ Aaron Badgley, All Music Guide
'Child: Music for the Christmas Season'
Release Date 10/27/1997
Tracks 22
Label Sheeba
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What The Critics Say
Child: Music for the Christmas Season is a double-disc set which finds Jane Siberry running through a selection of holiday-oriented songs, throwing a few originals for good measure. Siberry is warm and friendly throughout the album, but she hasn't abandoned her sense of humor -- much of the on-stage patter is sharp and cutting. In all, it's a good souvenier for dedicated fans. ~ Thom Owens, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Appropriately, Teenager is comprised entirely of material Jane Siberry wrote as a teen and recorded as an adult. While the songs aren't quite as accomplished as her later work, it's nevertheless surprisingly engaging -- it's quite melodic, and the songs often have a bright, innocent quality which is quite refreshing in light of the somberness of much of her later work. Still, these are subtle differences that only the most devoted fans will be able to hear, and those are the fans who will cherish Teenager the most. ~ Thom Owens, All Music Guide
What The Critics Say
Jane Siberry's fourth and final album during her seven-year tenure on the major label Reprise Records, Maria is a decisive break from the lushly layered art pop of her previous work. Recorded with a quintet of jazz players led by trumpeter David Travers-Smith and pianist Tim Ray, Maria is Siberry's Astral Weeks, a song cycle of lengthy, slowly unfolding tunes lacking conventional pop song hooks but awash in hypnotic beauty. Siberry makes the comparison particularly plain on the first two tracks, "Maria" and "See the Child," which both feature incantatory vocals and rushes of cyclical, chanted phrases. A note in the CD liner says the album's basic tracks were recorded in a single three-day session in September 1994, and the songs' improvisatory freshness bears that out. Roughly balanced between jazz and pop in a manner roughly akin to Joni Mitchell's Mingus, the songs make a virtue of their stylistic freedom: even the closest thing to a conventional pop song here, "Lovin' Cup," features loose, off-the-cuff fills by Ray and Travers-Smith and Siberry's pleasantly meandering vocal melody over an atypically funky rhythm section powered by Christopher Thomas' discofied bass riff. The album's culmination, coming after two minutes' silence following the next to last track, "Oh My My" adds a tabla and sitar to further confuse the genre boundaries. A 20-minute epic (which Siberry had originally intended to release on a separate CD before Reprise refused to release a two-disc set), "Oh My My" never threatens to dissolve into aimless jazz-rock noodling in the manner of other side-long experiments in the style. Siberry's impressionistic lyrics weave in lines from earlier songs on the album, alongside hushed spoken word interludes and interpolations of childhood songs like "Puff the Magic Dragon" and "Mary Had a Little Lamb." It's nowhere near as pretentious as that description sounds, although in lesser hands, it probably would be. Instead, it sounds like the logical culmination not only of this album, but of this stage of Siberry's career. (Certainly multi-part mini-epics like "Mimi on the Beach" and the three-part "Map of the World" sound in retrospect like they were leading up to this.) As a result, it seems fitting that this was the end of Siberry's major-label tenure, and that her next release was the decks-clearing Teenager, a largely solo album of folk-pop songs she had written in her teens. ~ Stewart Mason, All Music Guide
'Jane Siberry'
Release Date 10/10/1994
Tracks 9
Label East Side Digital
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What The Critics Say
Until East Side Digital finally issued Jane Siberry on CD in 1994, this 1981 album was difficult to find even in the singer/songwriter's native Canada. Originally released on the tiny Toronto label Street Records, Jane Siberry is a low-budget affair with none of the lushness that began to predominate in Siberry's music as early as 1983's No Borders Here. Still, Siberry's lyrical quirks are already in full effect, as on the bizarre little girls-talk vignette "This Girl I Know" and the "what I did on my summer vacation" essay "The Sky Is So Blue." Though the album isn't quite the barebones folk some articles about Siberry made it out to be later in her career, it's still a pretty minimal affair compared to, say, The Speckless Sky. Siberry plays the majority of the instruments herself and sings almost all the vocals in self-harmony. Fewer than half of the nine songs have percussion, and John Switzer, who would go on to become Siberry's main musical foil, is restricted to playing bass on a handful of songs. The results are roughly akin to Joni Mitchell's early-'70s albums viewed through a post-punk prism, with the downright poppy "Marco Polo" and the amusing "Writers Are a Funny Breed" among the highlights. ~ Stewart Mason, All Music Guide
