With her seventh solo album recently released and two decades of success behind her, including an Oscar nod, singer/songwriter Aimee Mann has a lot to smile about.
Just don�t ask her to.
She makes it clear she despises this type of request in her new CD title @#%&*! Smilers, which audiences are expected to insert their own curse word into. It�s pointed at a phrase Mann and a friend coined to describe people who feel the need to tell others to be more � well, smiley.
The characters in Mann�s 13-song pop collection would likely share this sentiment. They include a drug addict, a has-been, an insecure artist and a host of other troubled personalities.
�I think it�s a mix of both (real and fictional characters) � there�s definitely songs about people I know, but a lot of it is fictional,� says Mann about Smilers, released on her own SuperEgos label.
Highly praised for her lyrics (characters and situations in the 1999 movie Magnolia were written based on her songs), Mann�s carefully crafted storytelling is often confessional and/or cautionary.
�(Songwriting) is good for the kinds of things that you can�t really talk to anybody about and you can barely sort of even explain to yourself. It�s a way for your subconscious to kind of communicate with your self,� Mann explained.
In synth-pop opener Freeway, the former �Til Tuesday front woman documents the struggles of a drug-addicted friend.
�I think everybody struggles with obsession to a certain extent because I think it�s a mechanism by which people make themselves feel better ... It gives you the illusion of control and power.�
And while the Los Angeles-based singer stays true to her soulful pop sound, Smilers differs from her other work in its lack of electric guitar. A decision she says was made during recording because �we just didn�t need it.�
Instead, Mann focuses on keyboard, acoustic guitar and synthesizers.
For instance, the last track, Ballantines, is an almost cabaret-sounding tune, albeit telling the disheartening story of a one-time hot shot now down on his luck.
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