Got this yesterday with the amazing deluge of new releases...I've been too mesmerized by the new Outkast to give Rufus my full attention, but the one listen I've given to "Want One" left me pretty happy with it...a little bit more urbane than the last album, but much fuller-sounding, very lush. His songwriting is tops as always. Anyone else have this?

not yet, i could only afford one new release and Outkast got the nod. But Rufus is next on my list... Hopefully tonight

(endo adds this to his list for the weekend trip to the wrecka stow)

Heh - yeah, it's on my weekend list too. Wish we could go together, Endo!!

theblueangel said:

that would be the best!

endorphin74 said:

i wanna come too!

have not yet gotten it, but am gonna this weekend

QUESTION: is there a song on there that sounds amazingly similar to "April Fools"? because i heard a song on the radio the other day that sounded just like Rufus, and eerily like "April Fools" and i thought to myself "self, is this the new Rufus? it sure sounds like 'April Fools'"



anyone?

review from AMG:

2.5 stars


Rufus Wainwright croons and cries through another set of obscenely lush and opulent pop operettas on his third album Want One. As is to be expected, the songs are meticulously layered and richly textured, with full orchestral passages and many-throated harmonies. Producer Marius deVries (Björk, Massive Attack, Madonna) didn't mess with the already successful Wainwright sound, allowing for the young singer/ songwriter/multi-instrumentalist to explore his familiar themes of love, loss, and "singin' about places" with the anticipated fanfare and flourish. The album's strongest segment comes in the middle, beginning with the intimate-to-epic "Go or Go Ahead," barreling through the wildly spinning rock opera "14th Street," and landing softly on the gently chiming "Natasha." Oddly, unlike his previous two releases, Wainwright's musings seem less focused and a little meandering on a handful of the songs. The lazy, loping "Want" is much more stream-of-consciousness than anything else he's recorded, and the slightly goofy "Vibrate" (with its references to Britney Spears and electroclash) may sound dated before the album is played a second time. The sessions that produced Want One were apparently so prolific that another volume (Want Two?) is in the works, but it could turn out to be that distilling both albums down to one would have made for a more complete overall work. Who knows, this new looseness to his rigid pop constructivism may end up being a good thing, and, frankly, Wainwright could be singing lists of names out of the phone book and it would still be more exciting and inventive than 99 percent of the other albums out there. — Zac Johnson

there's a second volume in the works?


interesting...

Hey all,

I write a music column called "Audiophile" for Q-Notes, the gay and lesbian newspaper of North and South Carolina. I interviewed Rufus Wainwright for my latest column. Here's a reprint:

Peace, David

---

www.q-notes.com

COLUMN TITLE: Audiophile

HED: Rufus Wainwright returns with the best album of his career

SUBHED: Rehab stint helped singer regain his focus

PHOTO CAPTION: Rufus Wainwright: 'I went into a drug-induced depression and eventually had to go into rehab.'

On "God Only Knows," a track from the Beach Boys 1966 masterwork "Pet Sounds," Brian Wilson sings to his paramour, "God only knows where I'd be without you." It's a great line — even if it's not true.

You see, God isn't the only one who knows that without his beloved Wilson would be laid up in some gutter with his emotional entrails splayed out. We can hear that the singer unmistakably knows it too.

Similarly, when Rufus Wainwright dolefully intones "God knows what all these new drugs do" on a cut from his riveting new album "Want One," it's clear that he understands the pitfalls of addiction as deeply as any omniscient deity.

Which is why it's little surprise when the 30-year-old singer/songwriter tells me that in the middle of writing the new record he checked himself into a drug treatment facility to kick a crystal meth habit.

"I went into a drug-induced depression and eventually had to go into rehab at the end of it. The main culprit for me in that — and I think for many gay men — was crystal meth. I started doing that stuff and it really affected the part of my gay brain that had suffered from years of prejudice. It just made me want to forget all of the problems that one goes through with being gay."

Despite the attendant hardships, Wainwright found that rehab was an unexpected blessing in the creation of "Want One" — and its planned 2004 followup "Want Two."

"I had been really worried about making the next record. But when I realized that I had to put everything on hold and concentrate more on my own personal issues, it all came into place. While I was away, my friends, family, record company and manager rallied around me. When I came back everything was ready. I had written a lot of songs before going away and a lot of songs during and a lot of songs after. I went into the studio and in six months had recorded two albums."

Critics considered Wainwright's eponymous debut — which plays like a collection of Tin Pan Alley standards interpreted by The Beatles at their most symphonic — the perfect antidote for the pop doldrums of 1998. The album appeared on a host of year-end best lists and Rolling Stone crowned Wainwright music's Best New Artist.

The performer avoided the sophomore jinx when followup album "Poses" was released in 2001 to equal acclaim. Music journalists noted that Wainwright had successfully enlarged his musical palette without sacrificing his theatrical flair.

The album's exploration of the often surface nature of New York gay life (the title track offers this great couplet: "There's never been such grave a matter / As comparing our new brand name black sunglasses") was incisive and witty and revelatory — even, in retrospect, to its creator.

"I looked at a lot of the gay scene at the time thinking, 'Oh, I'm just an observer here and I'm partaking in a very voyeuristic manner.' The song 'Poses' was written about someone else, but in hindsight it was really about me. Little did I know..."

This almost self-unaware indulgence in the Chelsea aesthetic, the shock of 9/11, dissatisfaction with his (now former) management and the pressures of writing a new album culminated in Wainwright's aforementioned stint in rehab.

After several intensive months, the artist, newly clearheaded and confident, was ready to jump back into the fray.

DreamWorks Records exec Lenny Waronker (who signed Wainwright) had earlier suggested that Marius deVries (Madonna, Björk, David Bowie) produce the third album. Wainwright says he didn't know what to think at the time ("mainly because I was high") but soon warmed to the idea: "Björk's 'Debut' is my all-time favorite record so that was a plus. And also Marius wrote me a really lovely letter when I was in rehab and that sealed the deal."

SUBHED: A new classic

The kinship between "Want One" and "Pet Sounds" extends well beyond the similarities of a single lyric. The connection is conspicuous in deVries' use of layered vocals (some harmony parts contain up to 350 overdubs of Wainwright's voice), the gripping orchestrations and the overarching sense that Wainwright's optimism, much like Wilson's as he walked the knife-edge of sanity, has been sanded thin by the grit of living but not breached.

A good example of this nexus is the buoyant, gospel-tinged “14th Street” which chronicles Wainwright's drug treatment from admission ("You walked me down 14th Street / For the doctor to meet after thoughts of the grave / In the home of the brave and of the weak") to triumphant return ("Don't ever change, don't ever worry / Because I'm coming back home tomorrow / To 14th Street where I won't hurry / And where I'll learn how to save, not just borrow").

The song is also where listeners can hear Wainwright's mother, Kate McGarrigle, on banjo. The singer's complex relationship with his musical parents — McGarrigle has released eight albums with sister Anna and father Loudon Wainwright III has issued nearly a dozen folk-rock albums since the early '70s — is an important component of "Want One."

Wainwright explains, "My relationship with my mother is very intense, ferocious, even more so than with my father. There is this thing with mothers: though they’re usually the ones who show you the most love and who are the most nurturing, they’re also the ones who have the greatest capacity to rip you apart."

As for his father, Wainwright adds that their relationship "is one of intense love, intense fear, intense respect and intense disrespect."

In the elegiac "Dinner At Eight," the song's central image of a father walking out on a son in the "drifting white snow" is so arresting because the life-altering experience occurred in just that setting, Wainwright reveals.

"A lot of the keys to my psyche and my well-being lie in that relationship. The issues that result from not having a father around, or the son rebelling against the father, are universal. Their impact is incalculable."

Still, recent events have given Wainwright a new perspective on his parents. On "Want," the album's key — and most understated — track, he brings it all back home: "I don't want, no I really don't want / To be John Lennon or Leonard Cohen / I just want to be my Dad / With a slight sprinkling of my mother." It's a genuine, affecting moment amidst an album that's brimming with them.

Wainwright tells me that "Want One" is his last grab for commercial success. ("I'm still young enough to go on TRL," he jokes.) And if there's any justice, the recording will make a sizable dent in the charts. But even if it stalls in the marketplace, critics will rightfully hoist this new classic to the tops of their lists come year's end.

"Yeah, yeah," Wainwright says, modestly, "but sometimes I wish I could just make a dance record or something."

"Want One" is in music stores now. "Want Two" will be released sometime next year.

crystal meth???


oh no



i expected a better type of drug addiction from him. that's so low rent...

I havent purchased his new one, countin on gettin it this week..

Lets just say this, I kindof dug his last album.. very coolish mellow vibe thats easy to dig.. would I like this new one?

someone break this jam session down, I wanna know more.

i almost bought "Want One" today.



i actually decided against it. i'm a fan, but i can wait. too many things on my plate at the moment, musically and financially, to get this right now.

I just "discovered" Rufus...

This past week I saw a commercial for the release of Want One on Bravo and decided to go googling to see what I could find. I listened to the whole cd via a realaudio stream from www.rufuswainwright.com and then ran out Friday and grabbed the disc.

Frankly, I haven't been this excited about an artist since I came across a copy of Joni Mitchell's "Hissing Of Summer Lawns" in a used record store back in '86.

The disc has only left my car's CD player long enough for me to rip the tracks into iTunes on my G4 Cube.

i love rufus's music and i will eventually get around to really listening to it but for now, man, there is just way too much new, upbeat music for me to dig into. erykah, outkast, bowie...just so much!