Ani DiFranco swam further into the pop music pond with the expansive expressionistic experimentation of this new twist on her frenetic funky folk. After the success of the dark and cathartic 'Dilate' and the exuberance her double live album 'Living in Clip' she was ready to try something new in the studio: "This album seemed to happen more organically than earlier studio releases ... I think there's more on this record that deals with my job, since my job is...creeping into every little part of my life and making loud noises. It's a little hard for me to avoid these days, sort of reflecting on the state of the folkstress in the world...I'm trying to learn...how to record the songs sounding like themselves. The recording studio is just a very different bag of doughnuts from the stage. I'm really used to being on stage, but making records is still a bit mysterious and obscure for me. I think of music as a social act, so to be in a recording studio is bizarre to begin with...The live album ["Living in Clip"] sounded real to me, and when I go into a recording studio it's kind of hit and miss, and I'm not sure why. So I think on this record I was trying to record the songs in a more natural state. Just live, with the band, and we were jamming a lot, being very relaxed, not like, 'Button goes down, red light is on, whoa, make something for all eternity'... I hate to be implicated in the pop music circus, but I'm trying to sort of explore the possibility that having an expanding audience or selling more records doesn't mean you're selling out. I guess I'm kind of hoping that my beloved audience will not think that there is a crime in being successful...They'll give me license to keep doing what I'm doing and keep the focus on the music and the politics despite what happens around it...I guess I've just been inspired by people who write and speak their experience in hopes of adding another flavor to the soup that is our culture. There are only so many takes on life you're gonna see on TV or learn about in school, and I think that many of us have very different experiences from the dominant discourse. . . . I think that storytelling is a very valuable political act for all of us. It builds awareness of the variety of stories that exist in the society."
'Little Plastic Castle' was produced by DiFranco and engineered by Bob Doidge, Andrew Gilchrist, and Mark Hallman at the Congress House in Austin, Texas. The sessions featured Ani DiFranco on acoustic guitar, guitar, percussion, concertina, drums, electric guitar, keyboards, vocals, and bass pedals; Jon Blondell on trombone; Andrew Gilchrist on pump organ; Jon Hassell on trumpet; Sara Lee on bass; Jerry Marotta on drums; Jason Mercer on electric bass, upright bass, and vocals; John Mills on baritone saxophone; Gary Slechta on trumpet; and Andy Stochansky on drums, vocals, and talking drum. The album incorporates elements of jazz and latin and ska to her sound in a rich tapestry of textures using electronic samples and dance rhythms. DiFranco says: "Folk music is not an acoustic guitar--that's not where the heart of it is. I use the word 'folk' in reference to punk music and rap music. It's an attitude, it's an awareness of one's heritage, and it's a community. It's subcorporate music that gives voice to different communities and their struggle against authority."
After seven albums (Ani DiFranco in 1990, Not So Soft in 1991, Imperfectly in 1992, Puddle Dive in 1993, Out of Range in 1994, Not a Pretty Girl in 1995, and Dilate in 1996) on her own Righteous Babe label, 'Little Plastic Castle' became her highest charting album, peaking at number twenty-two on the US album chart; yet DiFranco still considers herself an iconoclast: "So much of the supposed alternative music is so co-opted. Anything that's commercially generated through multinational corporations is suspect. But that being said, there is a continuing underground movement of folk music--politically progressive or oriented roots music. I don't know if there is a Pete Seeger or a Woody Guthrie burgeoning now, but if there is, it's up from that underground. It's not going to be on Sony Records...The possibilities for counteracting the status quo are so much greater now than they were in the day of Woody Guthrie. When Woody had a day's work with Columbia Records and got his $25, that was a good day's work. It wasn't in the scope of the imagination at the time that a person could make her own record and control the means of production or labor. I want people writing 'people's songs' to rise to that possibility...What better example of the commodification of the feminist movement is there than this 'spice-grrrl-power' watering down of the real politics of feminism? I would have hoped as a society that by the 21st century we would be at the point where both sexes embraced that word--where we all identify as feminists unless we're just blatant misogynists. There is an ingestion of corporate media propaganda that made 'feminism' a dirty word, a taboo word. Young women have swallowed that and have refused to use the one word in the English language that represents the idea that women also have the right of self-determination. I've embraced that amongst my many 'F' words--feminism, folk music, all that uncool stuff...Language is the way that we know our world. To take a word as big as 'feminism' out of our vocabulary, out of a generation of young women, let alone young people, is incredibly disempowering. If you can't say the word, you can't embrace the concept."
http://www.righteousbabe.com/
"Little Plastic Castle" – 4:03
In a coffee shop in a cityWhich is every coffee shop in every city
On a day which is every day
I picked up a magazine
Which is every magazine
Read a story, and then forgot it right away
They say goldfish have no memory
I guess their lives are much like mine
And the little plastic castle
Is a surprise every time
And it's hard to say if they're happy
But they don't seem much to mind
From the shape of your shaved head
I recognized your silhouette
As you walked out of the sun and sat down
And the sight of your sleepy smile
Eclipsed all the other people
As they paused to sneer at the two girls
From out of town
I said, look at you this morning
You are, by far, the cutest
But be careful getting coffee
I think these people wanna shoot us
Or maybe there's some kinda local competition here
To see who can be the rudest
People talk
About my image
Like I come in two dimensions
Like lipstick is a sign of my declining mind
Like what I happen to be wearing
The day that someone takes a picture
Is my new statement for all of womankind
I wish they could see us now
In leather bras and rubber shorts
Like some ridiculous new team uniform
For some ridiculous new sport
Quick someone call the girl police
And file a report
In a coffee shop in a city
Which is every coffee shop in every city
On a day which is every day
"Fuel"
They were digging a new foundation in Manhattan
And they discovered a slave cemetery there
May their souls rest easy now that lynching is frowned upon
And we've moved on to the electric chair
And I wonder who's gonna be president
Tweedle Dumb or Tweedle Dumber?
And who's gonna have the big
Blockbuster box office
This summer
How 'bout we put up a wall
Between the houses and the highway
And then you can go your way
And I can go my way
Except all the radios agree with all the TV's
And all the magazines agree with all the radios
And I keep hearing that same damn song
Everywhere I go
Maybe I should put a bucket over my head
And a marshmallow in each ear
And stumble around for another dumb numb week
For another hum drum hit song to appear
People used to make records
As in a record of an event
The event of people
Playing music in a room
Now everything is cross-marketing
It's about sunglasses and shoes
Or guns or drugs
You choose
We got it rehashed
We got it half-assed
We're digging up all the graves
And we're spitting on the past
And we can choose between the colors
Of the lipstick on the whores
Cuz we know the difference
Between the font of twenty percent more
And the font of teriyaki
You tell me
How does that make you feel?
You tell me what's real
They say that alcoholics are always alcoholics
Even when they're dry as my lips for years
Even when they're stranded on a small desert island
With no place in two thousand miles to buy beer
And I wonder is he different
Is he different
Has he changed
What he's about
Or is he just a liar
With nothing to lie about
Am I headed for the same brick wall
Is there anything I can do
About anything at all
Except go back to that corner in Manhattan
And dig deeper
Dig deeper this time
Down beneath the impossible pain of our history
Beneath unknown bones
Beneath the bedrock of the mystery
Beneath the sewage system and the path train
Beneath the cobblestones and the water main
Beneath the traffic of friendships and street deals
Beneath the screeching of kamikaze cab wheels
Beneath everything I can think of to think about
Beneath it all
Beneath all get out
Beneath the good and the kind and the stupid and the cruel
Ther'es a fire that's just waiting for fuel
"Gravel"
"As Is"
"Two Little Girls"
"Deep Dish"
"Loom"
"Pixie"
"Swan Dive"
"Glass House"
was nominated for a Grammy for Best Female Rock Performance
"Independence Day"
"Pulse"
features a sultry trumpet solo by Jon Hassell.
full album:
All songs by Ani DiFranco.
"Little Plastic Castle" – 4:03
"Fuel" – 4:01
"Gravel" – 3:32
"As Is" – 4:06
"Two Little Girls" – 4:57
"Deep Dish" – 3:38
"Loom" – 2:51
"Pixie" – 4:25
"Swan Dive" – 6:28
"Glass House" – 5:18
"Independence Day" – 3:44
"Pulse" – 14:15
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