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When I first heard songstress Marnie Stern’s debut album, “In Advance of the Broken Arm,” I rejoiced at the thought this woman was going to take the stagnating genre of indie-rock somewhere new — somewhere so new, you couldn’t even give it the wretched title of indie-rock any longer. She was my Nirvana after the dark ages of the ‘80s.
That was just over a year ago, and now the album has had some time to settle. However, this week Stern released her second album, “This Is It and I Am It and You Are It and So Is That and He Is It and She Is It and It Is It and That Is That.”
It’s probably worth mentioning for the unfamiliar that Stern has a soft spot for long titles, but it is cumbersome for a reason. There has always been a method to her madness.
The title of the album tip-tip tap-taps to mirror her musical style. It’s quirky, but it’s something that I instantly liked when I heard it the first time. It’s absorbed in the moment. It’s unconventional. It’s euphoria for Stern and for the listener.
Stern’s music is so rapid and so sharp if one’s brain blinks, it will miss a step. But with Stern, that means one missed beat, missed lyric or missed song — and the point has been lost.
For this style, Stern has been given many technical kudos.
Stern warned her listeners in her first album, “Every single line means something.” Even though she said herself she was never “looking for a pot of gold,” Stern’s music has always been about artistic control over every aspect of sound. Stern warns again in this album, “the devil is in the details, if you are ready.”
The listener can hear that in how meticulously the guitars, the vocals, the synthesizers and the drums have all been layered over one another. There is nothing not intentionally done.
Stern sees something the others in her genre don’t, something I’ll admit my mind has always had trouble trying to wrap up and tidily put away. It’s been difficult for any critic so far to quantify Stern’s nuance and eloquence, even a year after her debut.
“This Is It,” however, is more melodic than her previous work. It still incorporates the disconnects and non-sequiturs of “In Advance of the Broken Arm.” They’re still the centerpieces, but they’re separated between brief tuneful moments that the older album did not have.
It also doesn’t come from the same sparkling, geometric state of mind Stern describes in “In Advance of the Broken Arm.”
If the listener thinks Stern has lost something, they never really knew her before. With “This Is It,” there’s no mistaking Stern is a rocker.
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