Title:Come Away With Me By: Norah Jones Released by: Blue Note Released on: February 26, 2002 Rating (out of 10): 8 Date: 04/03/2002
Six Reasons Norah Jones is Better Than Diana Krall
For once, all that noise is completely warranted. Norah Jones’ major label debut dropped recently (Come Away With Me), and, if you act now, you may just be able to pick it up before it gets pricey! If things tend to sway as hard in her direction as they are currently, she’ll be bypassing Diana Krall before very long. The similarities are both there (smoky-sounding singers who know their way around a piano), but Ms. Jones already has the inside track: while Krall is completely happy revisiting old jazz standards and nothing but, Jones mixes it up by writing a few of her own (Reason No. 1).
So while she can work wonders with Hank Williams’ “Cold Cold Heart,” she also manages to pen two of her own, including the title track, and co-writing another. It’s on these songs especially that we see her as she wants to be represented: a bit more hushed and intimate than the lot. Additionally, Jones has some talented songwriters under her wing in the forms of guitarist Jesse Harris and bassist Lee Alexander. Alexander’s “Painter Song” is as beautiful as that other oft-covered gem “If I Could Write a Book.” With lines like “And I’m dreaming of a place/ Where I could see your face/ And I think my brush would take me there/ But only if I were a painter/ And could paint a memory”, this is the sort of torch ballad to be replace “Book” in coming years. And that’s Reason No. 2 right there: Diana’s entourage changes far too often to allow them to scribble her out any lyrics.
Jones rarely raises her voice above the same quiet whispered growl, which makes things continually interesting. Interesting because all it takes are the mere intonations of certain words during a tune to completely change its destination. Accentuated growling, for example, is all it takes to transform the gently rocking “Turn Me On” into blues. And backing her vocals with more tracks of her own places “Lonestar” in the country category. As in the good kind. No. 3: Diana, dear friends, is far too tied to her Canadian roots to be considered a LeAnn Rimes country crossover superstar. Jones could most certainly do it with closed eyes. For now, though, hints of her capability are good enough. “But, she’s a jazz singer, right?” Perhaps, though she’s not confined to being that and that alone.
While the piano playing never really garners any extra attention on this record, it’s clearly obvious what does and will continue to: her Voice. Yes, it’s entirely deserving of the capital V as she can whisper and draw comparisons to the cracked splendor of Billie or sing the soft notes and come off sounding like the jazz album Alana Davis hasn’t got around to yet (really!). But she absolutely shouldn’t have committed the sin of doing Hoagy Carmichael’s “The Nearness of You.” The longing, the conviction, the believability? None of that. No singer should have recorded it past Nancy Wilson. Reason No. 4: Perhaps Diana has the upper hand here. She seems to cover the right stuff most of the time. Unless you count “Do It Again.” To go where Julie London already has is blasphemy.
Okay, now cutting to the quick and easy bullet style for the MTV generation, lest your attentions be lost forever.
No. 5: With a name like Norah, she’s all set to become a Diva. Jones isn’t quite so catchy, but that first name will stick. We’ve an Aretha and an Ella who’ve made their respective marks. Now it’s Norah’s turn. That last name is entirely extraneous. Diana who? Ross? Washington? Exactly.
No. 6: Norah comes from royalty. Her daddy is Ravi Shankar. Sure, she says she hardly knew him her whole life, that she’s just reacquainted herself with the man in the past few years and that her mom had more to do with her musical upbringing, but, c’mon—it’s in her genes, man!
No. 7: She’s a lot prettier. What does this have to do with anything, right? Diana likes to see how many photos of her wind-blown person she can squeeze onto an album—in the liner notes, on the front, on the back, on the spine. Overkill. Three or four of Norah isn’t quite enough, but that—combined with the olive skin and dark, mysterious eyes—makes her all the more sexier.
