Nellie McKay Pretty Little Head
Hungry Mouse
It’s hard to imagine that someone as fluidly eclectic as Nellie McKay could be anything close to predictable, but this Greenwich Village gal is every bit the PETA-loving, Nader-voting, über-brazen jazz-pop prodigy you would expect her to be. Accordingly, it came as little surprise last year when the feisty 24-year-old declared war on Columbia Records, the heavyweight label that had released her impressive 2004 debut, Get Away From Me. Supposedly, McKay was livid when Columbia tried to condense her follow-up album Pretty Little Head from two discs to one, leading to a bloody year-long divorce proceeding and the formation of McKay’s own Hungry Mouse label. Now, in Fiona Apple fashion, Nellie McKay has finally unveiled her much delayed—and much anticipated—new album to some deservedly rave reviews.
Aesthetically, Pretty Little Head is fishing in the same waters as Get Away From Me—which might be disappointing if we weren’t talking about an ocean-sized fishery. Again, McKay tickles the ivories and confidently slides from Carole King pop (“Cupcake”) to hip-hop struts (“The Big One”) to sultry jazz (“Long & Lazy River”) without ever sounding remotely out of her element. Similarly, her words are equally well chosen and delivered, whether she’s tackling animal cruelty in college labs (“Columbia Is Bleeding”) or playfully pairing with Cyndi Lauper on relationship related ditties (“Bee Charmer”). On “There You Are In Me,” McKay uses a cottony soft Judy Garland warble to spit some vicious couplets: “Everyone you meet secures a retched seat within your memory/Wipe their filthy feet upon the yearning of your soul.” Whoa, Nellie. At any rate, well worth the wait.
(Andrew Clayman)
Published in The Knoxville Voice, November 2006
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