ALBUM REVIEW: Pop Production Overpowers Rhiannon Giddens’ ‘You’re the One’

Anyone with more than a passing interest in modern roots music will be familiar with Rhiannon Giddens. For those who aren’t, the fact that she numbers among only four artists to have performed at both the Newport Folk Festival and Newport Jazz should tell you much about her eclectic tastes and abundant talent. The singer and multi-instrumentalist first came to attention as part of the celebrated folk group Carolina Chocolate Drops. Since then, Giddens has released two solo albums and won a slew of awards, including two Grammys and, this year, a Pulitzer Prize. You’re the One, her first solo record in six years, comes with plenty of anticipation and expectation attached.

This is Giddens’ first album to feature all-original songs. These songs have been written over the course of her career, and her chosen collaborators are also drawn from the old and the new. Giddens’ partner, multi-instrumentalist Francesco Turrisi, features alongside previous collaborators such as Congolese acoustic guitarist Niwel Tsumbu, bassist Jason Sypher, and multi-instrumentalist Dirk Powell, but there are also new faces here, including Dwayne Bennett on Hammond organ and Eric Escanes on electric guitar. Perhaps the biggest clue as to what to expect lies in Giddens’ choice of producer, Jack Splash, whose previous credits include glossy R&B stars Alicia Keys and Kendrick Lamar.

Album opener “Too Little, Too Late, Too Bad” rattles from the gates with a blast of up-tempo country-rock, driven by vamping piano and circling electric guitar. Giddens’ voice is in fine form, and it’s something of a shock to hear her in this setting. The title track brings us back to more recognizable ground, a fine country-folk ballad lifted up by Giddens’ sparkling banjo and swooping strings. As you might expect, there is plenty of diversity in the material. “Hen in the Foxhouse” sounds, for all the world, like vintage ’60s powerhouse soul, and it’s fascinating to hear Giddens tackle this number. Every sublime moment, however, such as the arresting fiddle-and-accordion intro to “You Louisiana Man,” elsewhere becomes bogged down by heavy-handed production, in which the traditional elements sound somewhat squeezed aside by adrenaline-fueled beats.

There is some beautiful material here, to be sure, not least the swaying delight that is “Wrong Kind of Right,” but too often, as on “Yet to Be,” Giddens finds herself swamped by the mix, subsumed beneath stomping drums and swaggering bass. It feels, to be blunt, as if Jack Splash has tried to force a round peg into a less-than-interesting square hole. Nuance and subtlety have always been the glistening jewels in Giddens’ music, and unfortunately, on this album, the more delicate moments are given little space in which to bloom. Every opinion is subjective. Many will enjoy this record, and with good reason. In traveling down a more conventional path, however, this reviewer can’t help but think Giddens has a little bit lost her way.

 Rhiannon Giddens’ You’re the One is out Aug. 18 on Nonesuch Records.