Break Up is the second album with Scarlett Johansson’s name on the cover. Two years ago the actress put out ‘Anywhere I lay my head’, an album consisting mostly of Tom Waits covers.

Despite benefiting from David Sitek’s creative arrangements and even David Bowie’s supporting vocals, the album couldn’t turn out well without the main ingredient: a competent lead singer. ‘Break Up’, Scarlett’s collaboration with singer-songwriter Pete Yorn, is slightly better in that respect, although this album was recorded prior to ‘Anywhere I lay my head.’ Perhaps sunny pop suits her better, and certainly a collection of easy break-up songs is a more approachable project than covering Tom Waits.
The album wears its heart on its sleeve: it deals with a break up, with an acrimony-free lightness captured well in the cover photo. Pete and Scarlett did themselves a disfavor by revealing their inspiration: the duets of Serge Gainsburg and Jane Birkin. To the extent that an inspiration source is a standard to live up to, ‘Break Up’ is unimpressive. But let’s be charitable and resist a comparisonthat puts Johansson and Yorn in a hopelessly disadvantageous light. The best listening strategy is to make abstraction of context.
So, what have we under this lukewarm cover? The opener, ‘Relator’, is a taut piece marked by a simple guitar riff and a line from the Beatles. ‘When I’m away/I write home every day’ is old and popular enough to be part of a cultural heritage out for grabs, right? On a first listening, ‘Relator’ seems like the most worthwhile song on the CD, but actually it’s only the most memorable, especially when compared to the track that follows it, ‘Wear and Tear’. Number three, ‘I don’t know what to do’, is a neat 1950’s style ballad about conflicting post-break-up feelings. ‘Search Your Heart’ and ‘Blackie’s Dead’, numbers four and five, are the album’s climax: a fortunate tandem of upbeat songs, albeit with dejected lyrics. ‘Search Your Heart’ reunites enough virtues to be declared the best track on the album: Johansson is at her best, and the melody is the most serious display of composition skill that this album has to offer. Scarlett’s solo ‘I am the Cosmos’, originally a Chris Bell song, requires more nuances than her voice is able to produce, though the instrumental part is alright.
This album is unlikely to be remembered in the music annals, but Scarlett Johansson has a respectable fanbase who, let us hope, will help it avoid undeserved oblivion. After the first listening, I was pretty sure ‘Break Up’ wouldn’t make it into my permanent library, but it’s so charmingly unpretentious that it earned itself a place on my shelf. |