The old adage “Don’t judge a book by its cover” most certainly applies to Rain Rain. Upon perusing her melodramatic, feminist, fantastical album bio about a disheartened, enchanted mermaid, followed by an examination of the album artwork resembling a modern day homeless Little Red Riding Hood accompanied by her savior wolf friend, the opening track of The Deadliest Fairy Tales was a complete unexpected aural surprise.
Nothing in the aforementioned creativity foretold a catchy dance electronica beat. Fully anticipating something more along the folk/New Age genres, the opening electronic dings and beeps of “Surfing the Ink” took a moment to digest. Then as the simplistic drum machine dance beat settled in and Rain’s confident vocals entered, the song settled comfortably into a retro-Madonna atmosphere – reminiscent of “Ray of Light” played at half speed. Rain’s voice possesses that same girlish edge as the Material Girl when singing low yet is also crystal clear on her mid and high range. Her phrases occasionally fall off and are abruptly clipped with a slight vocal squeak ala Rebecca St. James and her vocal flourishes are carefully controlled half-steps that hover around the central note.
“Hey Little Fawn…” utilizes tasteful vocal effects that do not detract from this more melodic, straight ahead dance/pop number. The song is fraught with drama in the bridge in this modern Bambi story but the tension is unfortunately severed by a cheesy computer sounding solo. The synthesized sounds are also a disappointment in “Lovers Lap.” The song opens with a galloping, eighties dance backbeat, but when Rain enters the instrumentation resembles a giant percolating coffeemaker. This odd array of sounds continues into the second verse where handclaps are added. While Rain does a nice job of blending her voice, the orchestration does not.
However, the synthesized flute duet that opens “The Jolt” is well done. The fully produced instrumentation and accessible lyrics make this song the most commercially viable. Throughout these dozen tracks on her debut album, Rain handles the vocals first-rate. Her best performance is evident in the angry “Jailhouse Mama.” Despite the synthesized overblown guitar opening and the annoying whistling solo in the bridge, Rain displays a big voice with true growls and excellent layered vocal harmonies.
The Deadliest Fairy Tales could not have come to fruition without Rain’s collaborator Brian Hazard of the electronic indie piano pop group Color Theory. His engineering work on the album is superb and no doubt his creative influences served as an excellent compliment to Rain’s. The two musicians deliver a magnificent gem with “Depending on the Bus,” a beautiful work of art hidden amongst the synth pop electronica. Hazard plays solo piano while Rain begins with angelic harmonized “ooo’s” to open this soul-bearing ballad. No techno beat here, simply a lovely deep metaphorical song about traveling the road of life on a bus, where you try to get where you are going yet you have to rely on someone else’s schedule. Brilliant.
Rain Rain should be pleased with her long awaited musical fulfillment. Here’s hoping her life’s journey only gets easier from this point on and is accompanied by much more music for the world to enjoy.
Reviewed By Kelly O’Neil
