So Tonight That I Might See

by

Mazzy Star

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This album has been in constant rotation in my cd player for years and years now. It really is a beautiful album. I never understood the people who said that all Mazzy Star songs all sound alike. I never thought that in any sense at all. they all are so subtle and subdued but yet all have their own personality. The album really coheres in a sense, but each song tells it's own story. It isn't simply a collection of random songs but more a book of short stories held together by a common thread.

From the first track, Fade Into You, a sort of surprise hit single on the radio with its country tinged, folk psychadelia to the grand finale, So Tonight That I Might See, a Doors inspired stream of conscious masterpiece, the entire album shimmers with emotion and feeling and dreamy landscapes. David Robacks sweet guitar playing and lush arrangements provide the perfect backdrop to Hope Sandovals detached but angelic voice and an almost faceless backing band provides the perfect foil for the dark, laid back duo who are fronting the show.

Fade Into You is a beautiful tune, filled with desertlike folk country-ish sounds, that never seems to wear thin. Bells Ring which is next, keeps the same spirit as Fade Into You, albiet with a more heavy, electrified spirit and then Mary of Silence And Five String Serenade bring the band closer to a funeral type atmosphere, but it's Blue Light, the fifth track that lifts the band out of it's misery. This almost tone poem, is filled with an aquatic organ sound that is perfect, almost with it giving you the feeling of a soft, blueish light shining through the window on a what was rainy afternoon during a hot summer's day.

She's My Baby is nice and is next, but it's the seventh track, Unreflected that has consistantly moved me and been one of my favorite songs of all time. It's gently ringing acoustic guitars, soft shaker and echoey vocals by Sandoval remind me of lying in a field in the desert on a clear summer's night with the brightest stars against the darkest backdrop circling above. This is a song that could simply be called cosmic... something which not many songs truly are.

The album then shifts gears with the coarse and tripped out "Wasted" only to find it's way back to dreamy folk on "Into Dust," which gives way the powerful closing track, So Tonight That I Might See. In similar fashion to The Doors, "The End," Sandoval sings with detached fashion almost unceasing string of words whih sound almost like an uninterupted thought from beginning to end.

So Tonight is a fantastic album. You may have heard Fade Into You on the radio at some point. Give it a try if you haven't already. It isn't music that you want to race cars to (effectively atleast) but it is a great cd. The playing by the band (except Roback) is nothing to run to the store about, but they do managed to create a dreamy atmosphere which is unbroken throughout the show. Highly Recommended.

"So Tonight that I Might See," contains Mazzy Star's breakthrough single "Fade Into You." Nevertheless, it doesn't hold up to "Among My Swan," the excellent album that was released after it. The problem mostly lies in the songwriting. After "Fade," the album becomes very uneven, hitting other high points like "Five String Serenade," "Bells Ring" and "Into Dust" but also foundering with clunkers like "Mary of Silence" and the title track. Hope Sandoval's remarkable voice, so haunting on the best material, sounds strained and remote on the lesser tracks.

Overall, an uneven album that nevertheless put Mazzy Star and unique singer Hope Sandoval on the map.