‘When under ether’ - PJ Harvey, 2007
Polly Jean Harvey or PJ harvey as she is more comely known as, has been around for a while now and I have always been a big fan. A couple of years ago she was playing at the electric picnic and I was an excited little boy as I had never seen her before. Turns out she was almost an hour late for the appearance and I ended up not seeing her at all as it impacted my schedule for other bands. A big no no for me is being late for festival appearances, do it on your own time. It irked me so much that as a form of protest I refused to buy a ticket for her gig in the Olympia a month or two later - not that it made much of a difference to anyone except me. I also didn’t listen to her latest album when it first came out but I eventually buried the hatchet. Like lovers quarreling she had some making up to do with me and when I eventually listened to her latest album the making up was done.
This is the first single from her latest album ‘White Lines‘ and marks a massive departure for the queen of the post-rock genre. Nearly all the songs are softer, mellower than her previous efforts. It always takes courage for a musician to depart from their signature sound as it can either create a whole slew of new fans or cause current fans to distance themselves from the artist. One of the first things I noticed from the new album is that she actually has a lovely, sweet voice that to me, was somewhat lost on her previous guitar heavy albums.
Lyrically I’m a bit confused about what the song is about. Its could be a number of things - childbirth, dreaming, abortion or even hallucination (thats if you have ever seen fear and loathing in Las Vegas and their penchant for Ether).
‘Something inside me, unborn and unblessed, disappears in the ether, one world to the next‘
So right now, I’m taking it that she is giving birth - ‘the woman beside me is holding my hand’ while Ether is being used as the anaesthetic which is causing some mild euphoria ‘The ceiling is moving‘ and ‘conscious of nothing‘ . Musically its mainly just a keyboard accompanying PJ and its the keyboard that accentuates the feeling of helplessness throughout the song. Check out a live version of the song from Copenhagen here
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