The Garden, a PJ Harvey Discussion Site

alonbp wrote:The Q review is great, but it's the second (I think) piece I've read that mentions only Flood and John Parish as producers. Surely Polly's a producer on it too, right? Why leave her out?

I think someone here had posted The Wheel's liner notes and it strangely did not show Polly as a producer.

keith wrote: But when she moves from the emotional to the political then the game changes. I presume that she wishes this new album to have some kind of positive effect on political thinking

I don't agree with this point of view. I wouldn't presume anything, in fact during interviews from LES she frequently expressed her aim as just presenting facts as an observer and not preaching anything.
Actually, this is what I like about her approach, because she portrays things objectively as a journalist (or, in her words, as an appointed war songwriter) should do and it's up to the listener to interpret them morally.
To me that is the understated quality of her work: she presents no judgement or morals but -in the case of next album- just reports things she has witnessed. I really, truly appreciate her effort to separate issues from judgements in this world of easy opinions we live in.

I agree, it would be too easy for her to just tell the listener what to think. But she is actually making the listener think about the issue, looking at the different angles and forming their own judgements which I think makes the songs 100 times better than if she came out and said, this is what i think about this. The COH for example, its just presenting what she has seen, contrary to a lot of commentators she isn't giving her own point of view in the song. It can be read in several different ways, the music itself adds to that ambiguity of the words. The verse's are very hopeful and happy I think musically and paint a grimmer picture with the words, while the chorus has more hopeful words and a sort of dissonant sound to it. And the Wal'Mart line at the end can be read in more than one way. It can be read as ironic, it can be read as a lament, it can be read as a good thing, it can be read as a double edged sword. Personally I think the song is brilliant, and all the discussion around it is a testament to that, its making people think.

This German site has some loose credentials for each track: https://www.dodobeach.de/11273120,4,lp, ... 74545.html.

Not that much of a new information, but, for example, Jean-Marc Butty is "responsible" for percussion on "Medicinals" and "Dollar, Dollar", and saxophone on "The Community Of Hope" is played by Terry Edwards.

More detailed liner notes for "The Wheel" (mentioned above):

.

I think the song is supposed to kind of seem a bit abrupt. A bit like she's taking you on a short tour of the area. Sort of the same as The Sky Lit Up in that they are both short songs, they go by really quickly and I think thats the point. The wheels more about repetition and getting it stuck in your head. I honestly think they are two of her best songs.

Me too I've noticed that the audio from iTunes tracks are lower than usual and lower that the video clip
didn't know about 'Mastered for iTunes', is a bad thing

I had iTunes versions and then I had Tidal flac versions of both songs. Yes, it is true that sound is different. iTunes versions are not so good. As many flac providers works in some countries, Tidal is universal. You can check flac versions from here:http://tidal.com/tr/store/artist/24912

http://www.metacritic.com/music/the-hop ... /pj-harvey

There is a review in "The Wire" from April: "One of the chief sources of the album's power is the value it assigns to the act of witnessing, of seeing and taking account of the most vulnerable."

http://www.exacteditions.com/read/the-w ... 9163/47/2/

Could somebody provide the whole text?

Kuk91 wrote:http://www.metacritic.com/music/the-hop ... /pj-harvey

There is a review in "The Wire" from April: "One of the chief sources of the album's power is the value it assigns to the act of witnessing, of seeing and taking account of the most vulnerable."

http://www.exacteditions.com/read/the-w ... 9163/47/2/

Could somebody provide the whole text?

http://www.exacteditions.com/displayPag ... format=pdf

Kujjj wrote:http://www.exacteditions.com/displayPag ... format=pdf

On my computer it's a very low resolution, I can't read a word - I think you must be logged in to this site to see a normal quality scan.

http://issuu.com/londoninstereo/docs/ap ... 4/34507442

http://beat.com.au/music/pj-harvey-hope ... on-project

The wait is getting utterly painful!

Nice to see all the good reviews though!

somme wrote:The wait is getting utterly painful! Nice to see all the good reviews though!

Ditto! We have almost 2 weeks left! I can't remember how long before the release LES leaked.

two painful weeks. everyday I'm hoping to see the songs on the internet before the release like LES. I remember hearing them before the release, I think at the beginning of February. Probably about two weeks before it was released.