Aimee Mann
The Forgotten Arm

(SuperEgo)

First Appeared in The Music Box, May 2005, Volume 12, #5

Written by T.J. Simon

On her fifth solo release since her "big hair" days with ‘Til Tuesday, Aimee Mann draws upon the talents of producer Joe Henry to help her to craft a brilliant concept album entitled The Forgotten Arm. This creative partnership between the sister-in-law of Sean Penn (Mann) and the brother-in-law of Madonna (Henry) proves to be a successful collaboration that, in short, has yielded Mann’s best work to date.

For the record, both Mann and Henry share a very literary approach to songwriting, and either could have been successful in other creative media. From a storytelling perspective, The Forgotten Arm is structured as a series of vignettes from the troubled romantic relationship of John and Caroline. He’s a heroin-addicted, washed-up boxer, who is relegated to fights on the county fair circuit. She’s the miserable girlfriend following him around the country trying to support him while he strives to be a better man and free himself from his personal demons. Like most conceptual outings, the storyline becomes murky at times, and Mann can’t resist filling it with recovery platitudes such I Can’t Get My Head around It’s "Kicking is hard, but the bottom is harder." In the end, both John and Caroline come to the conclusion that a painful existence together is better than pursuing tormented lives alone.

Of course, any conceptual work is only as good as the individual tunes that propel the story forward, and in this case, the songs themselves are irresistible. At times, The Forgotten Arm rocks harder than any other album that Mann has released to date, and thanks to Henry’s multi-layered, textural production, there’s a ton of music happening in each of its dozen tracks. Goodbye Caroline, for example, begins with the sound of a sparse acoustic guitar and gradually adds piano, percussion, and electric guitars beneath Mann’s clear and beguiling voice. In addition, the outing is also Mann’s most piano-centered effort, and tracks such as Clean Up for Christmas and That’s How I Knew this Story Would Break My Heart showcase the keyboard as a new core element of her fantastic compositional skill.

Overall, The Forgotten Arm is the kind of collection that will yield new and interesting discoveries each time it is heard, and given it is full of ultra-catchy pop songs that easily could stand on their own as credible singles, it’s also a rarity among concept albums. Mann is to be commended for her wise choice of Henry as a producer, and together, they should be applauded for tackling this ambitious project, which truly pays tremendous dividends for attentive fans. Indeed, there’s little doubt that their winning partnership makes The Forgotten Arm an early contender for the best CD of 2005.

The Forgotten Arm is available
from Amazon.com. To order, Click Here!

For Canadian orders, please Click Here!

For UK orders, please Click Here!

48th Annual Grammy Award Winner:
Best Recording Package

Ratings

1 Star:   Pitiful
2 Stars: Listenable
3 Stars: Respectable
4 Stars: Excellent
5 Stars: Can't Live Without It!!

Copyright © 2005 The Music Box