ALBUM REVIEW: With Piano and Voice, Rose Cousins Makes a Daring Exploration of ‘Conditions of Love’

It might certainly feel as though love, by now, has been explored in song from every conceivable angle. What more can there be to say? Plenty, it turns out, for as keen an observer and as bold a songwriter as Rose Cousins.

But on Conditions of Love, Vol. 1, Cousins doesn’t tell about love so much as she shows what it can feel like, good and bad. With just her voice and piano, she walks gently through anticipation, exhilaration, contentment, frustration, and loss. While light percussion and subtle horns occasionally underscore the mood, Rose’s majestic voice is what creates the atmosphere here, a reflective space that allows the listener to bring in their own experiences.

Conditions of Love starts, appropriately, at the beginning and ends at the end. The first track is an instrumental titled “To Be Born (overture),” and it all wraps up with “How is this (the last time),” whose big question is turned toward death. In between are songs that hold love up to the light and examine it, flaws and all.

The centerpiece of the album is “I Believe in Love (and it’s very hard).” Not but. It’s and. It’s hard to want to commit but preserve freedom. It’s hard to keep doubt from ruining a good time. Sometimes, there are fights between the most well-meaning people. But despite all of that, love is worth fighting for, Cousins insists, worth trying for.

Nova Scotia-based Cousins can write the hell out of a lyric; that’s how she won two JUNO Awards and many other accolades. But her ability to convey big ideas in just a few words works a lot of magic here. Two of the songs on Conditions of Love — “Denouement” and “Forget Me Not” — are mostly just lists of words, but they add up to something really powerful. On “Denouement,” Cousins plays with the idea of connecting and, possibly, disconnecting in a relationship. The first verse uses a simple list to capture the powerful rush of making contact with someone new:

Happenstance
Vast expanse
Circumstance
Second glance
Take a chance
New romance
Take my hand
Can I have this dance

“Forget Me Not” has a similar structure, with flower names sung over a slow, lush piano melody that builds steadily. It’s about growth, or at least that’s what it feels like. About reaching for something permanent and real during our time on earth.

The final song on the album, “How is this (the last time),” is breathtaking in its economy. “How is this the last time you’ll close your eyes?” she asks twice, the only lyrics in the song. Her fingers on a 1967 Baldwin grand piano do the rest of the work, with quiet chords that linger, then fade, until the last one, which trails into 30 seconds of devastatingly empty silence.

Conditions of Love, Vol. 1, isn’t trying to find something new to say about love. Rather, it’s a reminder that the turbulent feelings that go with the territory are actually common ground. Cousins’ triumph here is finding a new way to express the feelings that go deeper than words, and making love come out the winner, even when it’s hard.

Rose Cousins’ Conditions of Love, Vol. 1, is out March 14 on Nettwerk.