REVIEWS
Performing Songwriter Magazine
November 2006, Top DIY Pick
There's something pleasing about the idea of a group of
songs that create a mood in these days of iPods and downloads.
Songwriter Kristy Krüger has created just such an album
with Songs From a Dead Man's Couch . Many of the
tunes have an old-time feel, and even the artwork features
photos from eras gone by.
Especially noteworthy is "Gold Rush." Banjo
and harmonica ride the freight- train drumbeat while Krüger
sings of the excitement of California in the 1840s. "Little
Polyanna" features a slow swing groove that sounds
straight out of the 1930s. Clarinet, accordion and various
percussive sounds accent the backbeats.
Krüger's vocals have a flattening effect that leads
listeners to believe they're hearing a recording that was
actually made 70 years ago. Even a cover of Depeche Mode's
"Never Let Me Down Again" stays in the album's
character. Krüger will captivate with her stellar songwriting
and "Patty Griffin meets PJ Harvey" voice.
From Texas Music No. 28 (Fall 2006)
When Kristy Krüger coos, "I don't wanna see
no sunshine," on her song "Little Polyanna,"
you believe it — even when she whips out the kazoo.
With her fourth album, the dark, weird and wonderful Songs
From a Dead Man's Couch, the Dallas singer-songwriter (who
recently relocated to her old college town of Los Angeles)
has crafted the perfect soundtrack for your next absinthe
and opium binge — full of gloomy ruminations but lit
up with melodic beauty like a windowless room full of flickering
candles. Krüger's narcotic voice and gothic sensibilities
prove a perfect fit for her cover of Depeche Mode's "Never
Let Me Down Again," but it's her own songs that really
linger and haunt, from the sly but catchy opener, "Gold
Rush," to a handful of beautiful dirges that could
have really redeemed Lucinda Williams' otherwise forgettable
last album. Not since Tom Petty one-upped Roger McGuinn
with "American Girl" has a student trumped the
master as decisively as Krüger does Williams on "Talk
Radio." "I'm a real keeper if you didn't know,"
she sings on "Blackhole," and you better believe
that, too. — RICHARD SKANSE
Americana UK, Liverpool, UK
(the largest resource for Americana in the UK)
April 26, 2006 - Dark tales from Texan chanteuse
There is one thing that you appreciate when you are reviewing,
when you are itching to get to the first Built To Spill
record in five years, when you want to just kick back and
let the music flow over you, when things get in the way
- what you want is records like this one that go their own
way and make you forget all about indie-rock and gasoline
rainbows. I imagine that Kristy dresses how she wants without
reference to the vagaries of fashion - that’s certainly
how her music comes across. Strongly independent and original,
she chooses a particular style because it suits her to,
not because it will sell records. So what has she chosen
then? She mixes up Americana with other forms of music;
‘This is Now’ vamps like something from the
‘Chicago’ soundtrack, only better, the cover
of Depeche Mode’s ‘Never Let Me Down Again’
recasts the song as a spooky hayride - she calls it Ameritronica
(just call it good) - and ‘Talk Radio’ is a
melancholy piece with tears of lap steel, a little like
a female Jim White.
The glorious opening ‘Gold Rush’ shows that
she can, if so inclined, do country rock as well as anyone
including throwing in a memorable chorus, ‘Black Hole’
is unsurprisingly dark and skeletal, though the excellent
guitar work is like bubbles of melody popping throughout
the song. Her voice has a (cliché alert) timeless
quality to it and whatever setting she places it into, it
is up to the task of carrying off the songs and deadpanning
the touches of dark humour. There is little other than her
vocals on ‘The Prospect of Gold’ save some atmospheric
shadings of guitar, her voice full of breathy bravado as
it takes us through the song. Best of all is the almost
staccato annunciation of the waltz-like ‘The Night
You Never Came to Meet Me,’ her voice like something
leaking out of a hot valve driven radio as a white-walled
roadsters pass outside - like a hot hand in the small of
your back leading you to the dance floor, you are powerless
to resist.
-David Cowling
The Dallas Morning News, Dallas, Texas
June 2, 2006
Kristy Krüger’s roots are in folk and pop, but
over the course of four CDs she’s grown into one of
the most eclectic singers in the Dallas music scene. Her
new disc, Songs From a Dead Man’s Couch, veers from
old-time jazz-blues to a stomping hillbilly version of Depeche
Mode’s “Never Let Me Down Again” to a
trippy-twang style she calls “Ameritronica.”
Imagine a female Tom Waits produced by Daniel Lanois and
you get a general idea of the sound of Dead Man’s
Couch. Lyrically, it’s an album full of vagabonds
and fortune-seekers who keep getting more lost. As one character
puts it, “You can’t hit the bottom if there
is no bottom.”
-Thor Christensen
The Dallas Observer, Dallas, Texas
May 11, 2006, Dallas Observer Music Awards Issue –
Named Best Female Singer
Forget the voice--Kristy Krüger is one hell of a kazoo
player. When she lets loose live with the most underrated
of all instruments on "Little Pollyanna," a standout
track from her new album Songs From a Dead Man's Couch,
she never ceases to impress. Her songwriting and production
skills aren't too shabby, either...not to mention the fact
that she also plays guitar, mandolin, keyboards, water glasses
and harmonica. But it's her voice--a sweet, twangy coo combining
equal parts Aimee Mann and Patty Griffin--that's the most
impressive thing of all. Though she might have started out
as an Ani DiFranco wannabe, the newly released Couch sees
her adopting a sound much truer to her Texas roots, with
a stellar cast of our city's finest (Salim Nourallah, Doug
Burr, pedal steel player Todd Pertll, etc.) pitching in
to help bring her music back home. Well-crafted songs like
"Blackhole" and "Never Let Me Down Again"
are far more likely to appeal to fans of Kathleen Edwards
than fans of aggro-feminist folk music, and it's likely
the new set of tunes might finally win her the attention
she deserves--so don't be surprised if we're writing about
how great she is again this time next year. And Kristy,
if you ever need some back-up kazoo, you know where to find
us.
–Noah Bailey
Dallas Modern Luxury Magazine, Dallas, Texas
January 1, 2006, The Radar Music
Pro-ditional Love – Kristy Krüger’s dark
Americana sounds are anything but expected
“Everybody cringes when they hear those words, ‘singer/songwriter,’”
Kristy Krüger acknowledges over conversation and coffee
at a local café recently. “I don’t know
why they should…everything starts with the singer/songwriter,
how else does a song get written?” she laughs. For
many, the dreaded appellation evokes clichéd images
of mawkish solipsisms sung to the tune of six-string strumming,
or worse. In Krüger’s case, however, nothing
could be further from fact. Her latest release, An Unauthorized
Guide to the Human Anatomy is a genre-crashing wonder, a
multi-layered work of aural art that holds up to, and actually
demands repeated listenings.
Krüger’s musical inclinations have caromed somewhat
over the years, from early piano lessons, to jazz studies
at Dallas’ Arts Magnet high school, to her rediscovery
of songs and songwriting at USC, to years of restless coast-to-coast
troubadouring post-graduation. Now with three CDs to her
credit, and a fourth nearing completion, Krüger’s
art continues to define her trajectory. “At some point
I started writing songs, and realized, ‘man, I love
writing songs,’” she says. “It’s
like you get to be an actress when you deliver a story,
you get to be a writer when you’re writing lyrics,
you get to be a musician when you’re writing music
- it was everything I loved rolled into one.”
For An Unauthorized Guide to the Human Anatomy, recorded
in New Orleans, Krüger enlisted a supergroup session
team, beginning with engineer/co-producer Andrew Gilchrist,
of Ani DiFranco fame, Soul Asylum’s Dave Pirner played
electric guitars, Brad Houser (New Bohemians, Critters Buggin’)
added bass, and Drums and Tuba’s Tony Nozero guested
on drums. Krüger herself co-produced and played everything
else, including guitars, various keyboards, electronic loops,
banjo and mandolin. The collection is characterized by alternate
guitar tunings, Krüger’s intimate, almost breathless
vocals and idiosyncratic phrasing, and acres of background
voices, all hers. Painstakingly crafted, Krüger sometimes
spent 16-hour days singing, building up countless doublings
of herself on multiple parts. “I went a little wacko!”
she admits, but some of the effects achieved are astonishing.
Although some artists like DiFranco, Rickie Lee Jones,
Edie Brickell or Jane Siberry might serve as reference points,
Krüger’s territory is uniquely her own. The CD’s
title and artwork (an amazing pastiche of an anatomy textbook),
hint at the unity of the 13 songs, and as she explains:
“After I made the record, I listened to it for a month
trying to figure out what I would call it. I noticed that
each song represented a different aspect of being human…everyone
has pride and an ego, feelings of hopelessness, desire,
and times when they can persevere.” Gradually she
began to connect each song to a corresponding body part
and the concept retrofitted beautifully.
Krüger’s upcoming release, tentatively titled
Songs From a Dead Man’s Couch, is another step in
her self-discovery, reflecting her newfound fascination
with pedal steel guitar, which she’s teaching herself,
and her longstanding affection for artists like Hank Williams,
Beck, Lucinda Williams and Emmylou Harris. For the moment
she’s labeling the new stuff “pro-ditional”
(progressive and traditional) or “dark Americana,”
but call it what you will, the results will be unmistakably
Kristy Krüger, and no one else.
-Steve Carter
The Gambit, Weekly Alternative, New Orleans,
Louisiana
August 3, 2004, The Hot Seven (Best Bets of the Week)
On "An Unauthorized Guide to the Human Anatomy,"
Kristy Krüger is cool. The Texan who spent a year in
New Orleans sings, "I Got My Back" with the quiet
confidence of someone who actually does, and throughout
the album she's laidback, trusting her songs and voice.
The album, produced by Dave Pirner and Andrew "Goat"
Gilchrist, fleshes out her folk-based songs, and in the
process, Krüger finds some rock-n-roll attitude. In
"Coming 'Round the Mountain," for instance, a
little Patti-Smith like swagger creeps into her voice. For
someone who's often an acoustic warrior, this is unusual,
as is avoiding the coffeehouse strum.
-Alex Rawls
The Times Picayune, New Orleans, Louisiana
July 30, 2004, Sound Advice
Dallas singer-songwriter Kristy Krüger toured colleges
and coffeehouses as a solo artist for years and logged additional
years in Los Angeles pursuing a career in music. Her long
struggle and journey of self discovery resulted in a backlog
of insightful material that at times recalls Juliana Hatfield.
Krüger showcases much of it on her current, third album
"An Unauthorized Guide to the Human Anatomy."
She recorded the disc at the Truck Farm Studio in the Bywater
with longtime Ani DiFranco sound engineer Andrew "Goat"
Gilchrist. Her backing band included Soul Asylum frontman
Dave Pirner on guitars, plus Drums and Tuba drummer Tony
Nozero and former Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians bassist
Brad Houser. Each song is paired with a body part and the
packaging evokes a medical textbook. But the real heart
of "Anatomy" lies in Krüger's knack for memorable
lyrics and melodies, her careful, evocative vocals and smart
contemporary arrangements ranging from the alt-pop guitars
of the opening "Monsoon" and "The Pursuit
of Happiness" to the acoustic chill of the final "Alabaster."
-Keith Spera
The Dallas Morning News, Dallas, Texas
March 5, 2004 - Spotlight
Give Dallas-reared Kristy Krüger an “A”
for ambition. Her new record, “An Unauthorized Guide
to the Human Anatomy,” is an elaborate concept album
recorded with Soul Asylum's Dave Pirner on electric guitars.
The disc comes with a 24-page mock medical textbook that
pairs each of the 13 tracks with a part of the human anatomy.
For instance, Chapter Seven: The Guts introduces "Vendetta,"
one of Ms. Krüger's many slices of psychedelic folk-pop.
-Mario Tarradell
Quick, a product of The Dallas Morning
News, Dallas, Texas
March 24, 2004, Krüger sings from new CD
Dallas singer Kristy Krüger has a third independent
album called An Unauthorized Guide to the Human Anatomy.
It’s a concept project about flesh, bones, and observations
of life, she says. Dave Pirner of Soul Asylum helped out
on the disc, which she made while living in New Orleans.
Q: What’s different about An Unauthorized
Guide to the Human Anatomy compared to your other two albums,
Bachelor of Apathy and The Noise I Make?
A: I’ve grown since my first records.
Now, it’s really hard for me to actually listen to
the first two. I listen to some of the lyric lines and think
they’re cheesy. This one is more observant.
Q: What was it like to work with Dave
Pirner of Soul Asylum?
A: He was so nice. I was looking for a
guitar player, because I’d just moved to New Orleans
and he was the co-owner of the studio where I was working.
Goat (Andrew Gilchrist, engineer for Ani DiFranco) suggested
asking Dave. I asked and he was like, “Sure, I would
love to play on your record.”
Q: When people listen to your music, what
do you want them to take away from it?
A: I do hope that listeners both male and
female can relate to the overlying themes of desire, perseverance,
pride and loss, which are all a part of the human experience,
regardless of gender.
-Lori Price
