Tracy Chapman: Telling Stories : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

You could say Tracy Chapman's biggest sin has been assaying every subject with so much measured calm that passion is sometimes doused in the process. On her fifth LP - her first since 1995's New Beginning - Chapman doesn't show evidence of having changed much. She has a tendency to fret about bad things long before they actually happen. "What if I should find you're no good for me?/What if I can't be strong enough?" she sings on "Devotion." The unexamined life may not be worth living, but that doesn't always mean the examined one is worth singing about.

That said, there's a comforting consistency about Telling Stories - you can hear layers of confidence behind Chapman's sound. If there's no song here that captures the offhand intensity of Chapman's first hit, 1988's "Fast Car," the good news is that you don't hear Chapman desperately trying to capture it. Her silvered-gauze voice, after twelve years on the scene, shows no signs of stress, no evidence that she feels any pressure to try for a hit. She knows what she does well and sticks to it, and if the resulting songs don't shake the earth, there's no getting away from their careful craftsmanship. Radiant organ lines and silky interwoven guitars suffuse "It's OK" with a peculiar brand of laid-back energy - they're restful without being stultifying. And gentle plucked strings give "First Try" a Far Eastern-sounding sense of tranquility, the song's contours polished smooth as a worry stone. Like most of Chapman's work, Telling Stories isn't fueled by overt passion. What's surprising is how well she keeps it running on cool.