Fiona Apple – Fetch the Bolt Cutters: New Music Review

Fiona Apple’s been around for a long time, releasing her 1996 debut album Tidal at the age of 18. But she’s not prolific – Fetch the Bolt Cutters is only her fifth record, making each Apple release feel like an event. April’s Fetch the Bolt Cutters has proved especially major – in a fractured music scene, it’s dominated conversations about the year’s best record.

Fetch the Bolt Cutters deviates from Apple’s usual piano-driven music in favour of a percussion-heavy sound. The percussion came from found objects including baked seedpods and the bones of Apple’s deceased dog. Apple often initiated the tracks from basic recordings on her phone and, despite contributions by band-mates like bassist Sebastian Steinberg and multi-instrumentalist David Garza, the tracks retain the raw feeling of demos. Model Cara Delevingne, Apple’s sister Maude Maggart, and Apple’s dog Mercy are also credited with vocal contributions.

Musically, Fetch the Bolt Cutters resembles 1980s Tom Waits, as well as tracks like ‘Hot Knife’ from Apple’s previous record The Idler Wheel…. Apple is a more supple vocalist than Waits, however, and it’s her dramatic cabaret-style singing that gives Fetch the Bolt Cutters a distinctive flavour. First track ‘I Want You To Love Me’ is piano-based, but features some of Apple’s most extreme vocalising with her high pitched machine-gun impersonations at the conclusion.

Apple’s fascinating lyrically, and Fetch the Bolt Cutters moves is both insular and inspirational. Some songs like are directly inspired by minutiae in Apple’s life; in the case of ‘Drumset’, by bandmate and engineer Amy Aileen Wood borrowing Apple’s drumset without asking. The title is taken from an episode of TV series The Fall, and serves as a metaphor for freedom. Apple references another female auteur, Kate Bush, on the title track, singing “I need to run up that hill, I will, I will, I will, I will, I will.”

Most of these tracks are memorable thanks to Apple’s striking lyrics and vocal experiments. ‘Heavy Balloon’ addresses depression and uses a jazzy template with unexpected key changes. The stacked vocals on ‘For Her’ are effective, almost a capella apart from some percussion. ‘Relay’ rollicks along on a bed of percussion as Apple declares that “evil is a relay sport”.

Fetch the Bolt Cutters isn’t quite my favourite record of the year, and it may not even end up as my favourite album from Apple. Nonetheless, it’s a notable addition to a fascinating catalogue that marks Apple as one of the most significant acts to emerge in the 1990s. Releasing a record that sounds somewhat original is an achievement in a congested market.

Read More

19 Comments

  1. I saw her at a club show in ’96 or ’97, and the sultry sounds of hers I was hearing on the radio were betrayed by her 18-year-old stage personae. Pretty amazing talent, though. I was surprised to see her name in the credits on the new Dylan album.

    • I can imagine her being awkward on stage at the best of times, let alone at 18. She’s pretty clearly established as one of the best acts to come out from the 1990s, especially releasing an acclaimed record in her 40s.

  2. I do like the thick percussion in the back. Her voice jumps out at you. I remember when she came out in the 90s with Criminal and then I just stopped hearing about her for a while.
    The album title is a keeper.

  3. This thing got fantastic reviews so I decided to give it a listen when it was released. And I do like her singing. But boy, this didn’t do it for me.

Leave a Reply

About

Aphoristic Album Reviews is almost entirely written by one person. It features album reviews and blog posts across a growing spectrum of popular music.

Default image
Aphoristical View Profile
Graham Fyfe has been writing this website since his late teens. Now in his forties, he's been obsessively listening to albums for years. He works as a web editor and plays the piano.

Review Pages

Read about the discographies of musical acts from the 1960s to the present day. Browse this site's review archives or enjoy these random selections:

Blog Posts

I add new blog posts to this website every week. Browse the archives or enjoy these random selections: