‘I can’t keep on moving backwards,” Marnie Stern repeats on Plain Speak, over frenetic bursts of fretboard finger-tapping, layered vocals and urgent, scratchy rhythm guitar. This surge of forward momentum sets the tone for the idiosyncratic US guitar supremo’s first record in 10 years, one that is as playful and joyous as it is gleefully discordant.
After a stint in the house band on The Late Show with Seth Meyers and raising a family, Stern is bursting with life on her return and sounds as if she’s having a blast. She covers Ennio Morricone’s Il Girotondo Della Notte, from the 1972 film Who Saw Her Die?, replacing string work with snaking guitar lines and stacking and stretching her voice to replicate the original choral arrangements, the result full of grace and force.
Stern has always been able to extract beauty from chaos, plucking sugary melodies and complex harmonies from deep within a squealing cacophony – and this album is loaded with moments like that. Be it the pop-meets-math-rock punch of Oh Are They or the propulsive charge of The Natural, Stern is skilled at letting disjointed rhythms and infectious refrains seamlessly coexist.
What makes this all the more impressive is that most songs only last around two minutes. Listening to the album feels like witnessing a fireworks display, each song exploding to reveal intricate patterns before quickly vanishing as the next one launches.
