Every now and then an album comes along that’s so bleak and distressing, it feels necessary to discuss its emotional DNA as well as its musical make-up. Christina Perri’s Lovestrong. is that album, and at the risk of having this review read like a rejected draft of one of Jerry Springer’s ‘Final Thoughts’, here’s my feeling on the subject at its core, heartbreak.
Heartbreak is a nasty bug that makes you do silly things, like throw out your favorite pair of shoes and drink Sauvignon Blanc at 10.30am. Contrary to what this record would have you believe, it does not cause the affected human to blub their way through life, committing every square inch of their moist body to plotting the revenge of their ex-lover. It has never, to my knowledge, prompted the lovestricken to snipe, “How does it feel to swim in your own tears?” or warn, “You’re gonna catch a cold from the ice inside your soul”, until now, of course.
Now, the back story. Philadelphia singer-songwriter Christina Perri was working as a waitress in LA when her song ‘Jar Of Hearts’ was featured on reality show So You Think You Can Dance. Just two weeks later the track had sold 100,000 copies, its bruised and bitter tone appearing to have struck a chord with American audiences. The song’s saving grace is Perri’s pleasing alto voice, which is reminiscent of Alanis Morrisette if I’m being kind, and Avril Lavigne if I’m not.
Perri’s 12-track debut album is little more than an elaboration on the skewed sentiment in ‘Jar Of Hearts’, the one that suggests that a man who likes to sleep around is a depraved monster, hell-bent on exploiting honorable young women for his own nefarious LOLs.
If you can ignore the objectionable lyrics, opening track ‘Bluebird’ could be a sweet Regina Spektor piano number, featuring an especially becoming vocal interpretation of a beating heart. Oh, I see. She’s devastated, but quirky. But about a minute into the song, Perri collapses into a pudding of self-absorbed scorned balladry, where she’s doomed to stay for 44 minutes, best described by the song titles themselves, namely ‘The Lonely’, ‘Sad Song’ and ‘Tragedy’.
The delectable ‘Penguins’ is the sole respite, along with sweet ‘n’ simple love song ‘Miles’, one of only two mid-tempo songs on the record. The other, a fairly catchy number called ‘Bang Bang Bang’, incidentally only sounds joyful because it allows Perri to metaphorically murder her boyfriend. Elsewhere, the 25 year-old’s vocal talent and flair for melody is fully concentrated on exhausting the twin emotions of anguish and malice.
Don’t believe me? Another track opens with Perri pondering, “2am, where do I begin?/Crying off my face again”, and by the end of it, she’s “dancing slowly in an empty room” singing “a quiet lullaby” to comfort herself. Surely, even lovelorn grown-ups in their mid-morning wine phase deserve something more inspiring than that?