Between her work solo and aboard the Honey Pot, it sometimes feels as though there’s something new by Crystal Jacqueline every time one turns around. Of course she’s not quite that hyper-active, but it would scarcely be an imposition if she was.
Among the handful of independent artists who are truly at the top of their game right now, Jacqueline (and co-conspirator Icarus Peel) are almost singlehandedly flying the flag for a breed of psych-infused underground folk that only passingly reflects the values of its historically-revered forebear; that grew out of, not into, such vintage currents, and has been pushing it boldly forward ever since. And she’s certainly the most prolific, as this packed double album reveals.
Seventeen songs (and not a single second of filler) open out across an astonishingly broad palette. Opening with the rocking locomotion of “Your Bartered Bride,” calming a little for “Crumble”; shifting into the pensive “Yesterlove”; pausing for “Love”… and every one throws open a different window, be it the Animal percussion that punctuates “Akhbar”; the scything atmospheres of “Faerie Tears”; the brittle echo of “Your Dry Ghost.” And, of course, the chilling opening line to “Spanish Horses” - “last night as I prepared to die.”
All of which is patiently building up to “Await the Queen” itself, a twelve minute epic that unfolds like a medieval ballad, Jacqueline’s vocal poised between spoken word and melody, while the accompaniment relays lushly-arranged sonic stories of its own. And still Jacqueline’s performance is so all-enveloping that the guitar solo that cuts in around the nine minute mark really has its work cut out to match her.
It’s a breathtaking piece of work, possibly Jacqueline and co’s most self-defining opus yet, and an impossibly far cry from her (perhaps) better-known guise as a superlative interpreter of sundry folky-psychy covers. Even at the end, your ears are calling for more, and the closing “The Lost Song of Sleep” serves much the same purpose as “Goodnight” did on the Beatles’ White Album, slowly bearing you back to earth from the shattering peaks that preceded it. From: https://www.goldminemag.com/reviews/album-reviews/reviews-hawkwind-crystal-jacqueline-maxs-kansas-city-mortlake-book-club-year-country-kris-gietkowski-sad-lovers-giants-thinking-plague-sex-clark-five-ba-robertson/
