Cohen’s first album in six years delivers a dreamy collage of echoes and sonic souvenirs, but little substance.
Originally from San Francisco, singer-songwriter and model Hannah Cohen comes from a family of writers and musicians. Her grandfather Bertie Rodgers was a poet while her father is the jazz drummer Myron Cohen. Having initially immersed herself in the New York music scene working at the Village Vanguard, Cohen recorded her debut album “Child Bride”, in 2012 under the watchful eye of producer Thomas Bartlett with a band that included Sam Amidon. Two more albums followed, the most recent being “Welcome Home”, which was released in 2019, since when Cohen relocated to the Catskills, a subrange of the Appalachian Mountains named by the early Dutch settlers, which is where the inspiration for this new album “Earthstar Mountain”, has been drawn
Co-produced with her partner and collaborator Sam Owens, performing here under the moniker Sam Evian, and recorded at Flying Cloud Recordings, the couples converted mid-70s home and barn, the album boasts contributions from such luminaries as Sufjan Stevens, Sean Mullins, Oliver Hill, and Claire Cottrill (Clairo). The opening number ‘Dusty’, immediately introduces the listener to the album’s sonic world with its orchestration of flutes and strings attempting to capture the geographical ambiance of Cohen’s idyllic surroundings. Cohen’s vocals inhabit a similar high octave range to that of soul singer Minnie Ripperton which, encased within a lush arrangement, floats like a summer breeze. Unfortunately, there is very little change in tempo throughout, and though Cohen occasionally tries to spice things up lyrically, as on the track ‘Earthstar’, where she questions whether you can ever truly know someone, too often the laid-back vibe suffocates the life out of the tracks such as on ‘Draggin’, which has an early 70s Sly & the Family Stone groove but without the energy to lift it from its creeping lethargy. The strongest numbers are ‘Mountain’, where its deft percussive pulse offers Cohen’s delicate narrative of loss and sudden death of a close friend a structure on which to hang her grief, ably supported by Stevens on backing vocals, and ‘Rag’, with its much more stripped-back arrangement, just strummed acoustic guitar and occasionally arpeggiated notes on the piano that forces Cohens vocal’s and poetry into the spotlight and just as importantly leaves enough space for the listener to co-inhabit. Elsewhere the vocal gymnastics of ‘Una Spiaggia’, feel rather pointless while ‘Summer Sweat’, with its electronic drumbeat conjures up memories of Donna Summer’s work with Giorgio Moroder though the more meritorious ‘Shoe’ has an interesting indie rock vibe, again benefitting from less orchestration which allows the song to breathe.
With “Earthstar Mountain” Cohen has attempted to bottle the peaceful laid-back ambiance of her surroundings through a collage of blurred memories and distant echoes submerged beneath a multitude of sonic layers and lush orchestration, and to that end, it could be argued she has been successful. However, apart from a couple of tracks, the choice of arrangement tends to erase the distinctive characteristics that might have rendered these songs more memorable, resulting in a rather sanitised and insipid sound with little opportunity for the listener to connect or feel any empathy. Where the production is more sparse there are certainly moments of interest but inevitably this album feels more intent on creating a soundscape to match the local geography, delivering a listening experience akin to that of a warm breeze on a summer’s day, enjoyable for the moment but instantly forgettable.
