Suzanne Vega - Close-Up Vol 3

(Cooking Vinyl)
Folk-rocker Suzanne Vega revisits her most haunting songs in an intimate and personal manner in the third of four reinterpretations of her catalogue. The songstress who is probably most famous for her songs ‘Luka’ and ‘Tom’s Diner’ refers to this collection as the ‘mental health’ songs, as they take you into the darkest recesses of a fractured mind from start to finish.

The tone of the album is set from the first track 'Undertow' with stripped down reworkings of 'Solitude Standing', 'Cracking' (sounding as relevant since its original incarnation in 1984) and an acoustic 'Blood Makes Noise'. The most harrowing moment is perhaps a reworked string and guitar arrangement of '50-50 Chance'; the most realistic description of being a hospital bystander. Vintage Vega taps perfectly into despair but in a strangely uplifting way.