Troubled, Shaken Etc.

The second full-length from the Sian Alice Group on Social Registry is a logical extension of its 59.59 debut. TROUBLED, SHAKEN ETC. is equally ambitious, yet it's much more deeply focused as a recording than its predecessor. Vocalist/songwriter Sian Ahern and her London-based sextet have carefully constructed this 13 track, 53-minute set to draw the listener down into a hushed, deceptively minimal soundworld that paradoxically demands the listener's attention albeit graciously. Sian's voice is so lithe and slight that the listener, seduced by the songs' atmospheric tension, is compelled to listen with concentration to every word. It is an album: paced, sequenced, structured, and produced as utterly lovely, feminine, and subtly adventurous. The listener is given a soft, quiet, sonic bedroom and allowed to dwell, a mental place where time is suspended and the outside world vanishes entirely, for close to an hour.