Hannah Cohen - Child Bride Review

By Morgan Roberts / April 23, 2012

rating: 4

Reading up on her back story, as is the professional thing to do, I€™ve come to the realisation that, if I were a woman, Hannah Cohen would be the kind of woman I€™d hate. Mainly through relentless envy, but instead, as a man, I€™m mostly smitten with her, if a little envious that I have a penis and am not her, or more sensibly that I€™m not some kind of male variant of her. Sounds a little extravagant and over the top, I€™ll admit, but if I explain the back story to this artist and to this album, you might see why. So, we€™ll start at before the start with her grandfather. Said grandfather went by the name of Bertie Rodgers, who by profession went by the way of acclaimed poet and BBC broadcaster, and who socially went by the way of a good friend of Dylan Thomas€™. Her mother was a world touring type by a young age, meeting her father in San Francisco at the age of 17. Her father being a jazz drummer from the Midwest. From this meeting Hannah was born and raised, surrounded and educated by musicians, their music, and hippie intellectuals. Then of course we move on from the natural birth given highlights of her life to the things she took about to doing herself and excelled at. There€™s modelling for a start which took her around the globe, and lead her to New York where she became the muse of a multitude of renowned photographers, then of course she thought she€™d have a go herself which in turn lead to her making album covers, music videos and getting a book of her photography published. Then of course the burgeoning New York music scene which she decided to immerse herself in, many multiple dayed parties later, teaching herself guitar and playing compositions to silenced friends we find her recorded, full band backing and debut album releasing. When you add into the mix that that backing band is comprised of some of the finest musicians her scene had to offer who themselves have been associated with the likes of Bon Iver, Anthony and the Johnsons, Martha Wainwright, and the albums producer has worked with many of those acts too as well as The National you start to think this may be some well scripted day dream of hers that we€™ve all somehow been taken in with. You may even want to hate her a little bit. However, when you hear that voice, all is surely forgiven just as soon as it is forgotten. Don€™t Say opens the album and lays down the groundwork for what is to come with its gently picked chord patterns, sombre light of touch piano and Cohen€™s breathy and beautiful voice. The track has a serene and wistful quality as it lulls you along with it. The Simplest follows this up by adding some fuller instrumentation to the mix and a darker tone, but no less haunting. Shadows has a quality like it€™s a classic already, something you€™ve already heard and is already embedded in your head. Said shade of Shadows is soon lit up by the sunny and breezy California which shows there€™s more on offer than melancholy here and that Cohen€™s voice fits sunshine just as well it does shadowy sorrow. Boy + Angel for me personally is the runaway highlight of the album as it experiments with the formula already established on the album as well as it does the instrumentation used bringing some really atmosphere, but most impressively of all the track manages to be simultaneously harrowing and whimsical. The vocals too vary things up a bit making use of a lower purr as well as the angelic and sighful highs. If there are still any doubters at this point, then Sorry will make the final sell to them its simplicity and just how haunting Cohen€™s vocals are, possibly her most impressive display on the album, especially in the chorus and how genuinely hurt and pained they feel. If one wanted to make a complaint about the album, it could be its overly similar tone, that it kind of has a theme and runs with it. However, that also in another way works in its favour; you could sit and absorb the album as you acted like a proper grown up and thought ways about things, ya know, important thing like love and life and stuff. The songs not so much bleeding in to one another but flowing through the album as a whole. At the end of the day it€™s not a pop record, you€™re not going to find hooks and big choruses, what you fill find is songs that are lush in their arrangements, some real emotion and a genuinely beautiful and brilliant voice. Which is the real selling point here, exquisite and talented backing band aside, and as much as you may hate her for having one of the lives you dream; she can sing. http://youtu.be/oOoRREGelhE Hannah Cohen's FacebookAlbum Stream Released 23rd April