Tiny Vipers Can Eat Your Heart

Post Dated: May 31st, 2009

This is going to be a very strange review. Firstly, it is my first time discussing a new album on the site. Secondly, this is the strangest album I have ever listened to. 

The Band: Tiny Vipers

The Album: Empire Prism

It is made up of two tracks My Shadow (29 minutes and change) and Can I Use Magic To Stop The World From Dying? (22 minutes and change). This is the third album by the band. The first album: Tiny Vipers. The second album: Hands Across The Void. I’d rank all three as five star achievements.

Now, the whole thing is highly experimental... this is not necessarily a new thing for the band, though the vocals have been nearly stripped to oblivion, which is okay except that I’m in love with Jesy Fortino’s voice. But that’s the point. At least to me, it is.

You see, Jesy is... well she’s not what you’d call physically attractive. And some people have gone so far as to say she looks like a man... and I’m only saying this to explain the album, because I think it needs the explanation before you sit down and try to listen.

This is an experiment in pain, and isolation (correct me if I’m wrong, though I don’t think I am). Jesy is using this album to evoke pain... and during the first track I began to tear up pretty bad and started looking over my shoulder. It scared the crap out of me... and that is not an easy thing to do. But it’s music, and there is something special and quite mysterious about music. It makes us feel things for no good reason. It forces our minds into a mood. That’s why we listen to “pump-up jams” when we go to the gym or are heading to a party. They help us feel what we want to feel.

This makes me feel sadness and fear. And while you may not want to feel those emotions, sometimes it is important to let them take you over... it makes the happiness that much happier. We need to feel and recharge our batteries by allowing the whole spectrum in.

So, as I digress more and more, it seems that Jesy is using this music as a tool to release her sadness and isolation... even if she doesn’t show it in regular life (probably more so...). But I don’t know her personally, and though I’d like to meet her and try to understand I doubt that’ll happen any time soon.

But, if you’ve got a morbid curiosity check this album out. Her first two albums are much “friendlier” though at times they unleash a sense of what is covered on Empire Prism... but this is very new stuff for Jesy and a very new direction for Tiny Vipers (which I’m pretty sure is just her alias... not much info on her). And while I’m interested to hear more, I’d still like to get a few more tracks of her folksy stuff from the first two albums as well. Check it out.

P.S.- just found out she has a new album coming out (already? sweet!) called Life On Earth which I think will have everything I’m asking for. She has yet to disappoint! I’ll fill you in sometime in July.