Track Listing

1. Real Life
2. Eternal Flame
3. Feed The Light
4. Ride
5. I Defy
6. Flushed Chest
7. Christobel
8. Save Me
9. Anyone
10. We Don't Own It

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2451 in Music
• Released on: 2006-06-12
• Number of discs: 1

From the Label
Long time Rufus Wainwright and Antony And The Johnsons friend and collaborator steps into the limelight with a stunning debut full length release. Limited Edition digi-pack with numbered art print.

CD Description
Joan Wasser sings her jazzy, personal love songs in a fragile, paper-thin voice that recalls both the early-21st-century performer Norah Jones and the 1960s Greenwich Village singer Karen Dalton. "Christobel" is a gothic-tinged love song incorporating a deft violin solo (Wasser has played violin with Lou Reed, Rufus Wainwright, and the Scissor Sisters, among others), and her duet with Antony, of Antony and the Johnsons, on "I Defy", displays a sensibility that intriguingly combines pop with the avant-garde.

Customer Reviews

An Arresting Performance
My first encounter with the wonderful Ms Wasser
came in 2005 when I saw her open for Rufus Wainwright
at the Shepherds Bush Empire in London.

On that occasion I felt embarrased and ashamed that the
audience movement to and from the bar resulted in so much
extraneous noise that it was almost impossible to hear her.

Her frustration was palpable, as was mine.

Through the din however it was just about possible to discern
the emergence of a powerful new talent.

A year on and the release of 'Real Life' confirms my suspicion.

Ms Wasser is indeed a songwriter and performer of the finest pedigree.

She possesses a distinctive voice of considerable range and tonal colour.

Quirky, slinky, warm and commanding.

Her notable skills as a multi-instrumentalist are also evident
throughout this collection of ten extraordinarily varied songs.

The harmonic vocal arrangements on tracks such as 'Eternal Flame';
'The Ride' and 'I Defy' ( a duet with the splendid Mr Hegarty)
manage to be both complex and soulful.

The bluesy intimacy of 'Anyone' and 'We Don't Own it' are heartwarming.

A commendable debut demonstrating that Ms Wasser is firmly
on top of her game and not about to play second fiddle to
any of her illustrious friends.

The bigtime beckons methinks.

Ignore this at your peril
I wish the record of the year lists you usually get around Christmas were out now, this would be at the top of my list. I can't see anything else coming close. I beg you all to go out and buy this, don't let it be another undiscovered treasure that gets lost.

I bought this largely because of her collaborations, I was not sure exactly what to expect, but thought it would be worth a look. It was not an instant hit on first listen, but after the second, third....... and a few weeks later I am still under it's spell and can't stop listening to it.

The more you listen, the more you get from it, 10 tracks of pure gold, the only problem is, it's at an end before you know it.

Whenever I mention Joan as Police Woman I tend to get blank looks, this should not be! This is exceptionally good quality music, well written and performed. Her voice has a seductive depth, that lulls you into her world and keeps you there, wanting more. The haunting ghost like backing vocals are unusual and add a certain something.
She is a first rate musician as she has proved in her collaborations, but now she is proving herself in her own right. Also the live show sounds fantastic, every bit as good as the record, with the added pleasure of being in Joan Wasser's magnificent company.

WOW!!!
I think that word is infact an understatment. Joan Wasser is a talent beyond most other modern singer/song writers. She has honed her skills to create an amazingly unique sound comprising energetic art pop and classical string sections. A remarkable talent at also creating soft and heart renching moods on songs such as 'I Defy' featuring Antony Hegarty (Antony and the Johnsons, on which Joan and Antony's voices combine so perfectly to create a heart renching sound.

If you are considering whether getting this album is a good idea, then you need to look no further than some of the rave reviews that she has received across the UK press, including multiple album and single of the weeks. Joan is simply a brilliantly talented individual who effortlessly wraps her listener in a multi layered cacoon of music that somehow you thought could not logically exist in this form. Yet her it is.

So if you are bored of all the chart singer/song writers or you just want something different and unique to listen to then this is a must have.