Search - Tess Wiley :: Rainy Day Assembly

All Grown Up

favoriteone | Missouri | 09/18/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Tess Wiley was in part responsible for the harder edge of Sixpence None the Richer's "This Beautiful Mess". After leaving Sixpence, she went solo, using the names Phantasmic, Splendora, and Tess Wiley and Her Orchestra. Tess has always been a bit wild, (just listen to Phantasmic's cover of Come On Ring Those Bells and you'll understand) and in Sixpence she once blew a fuse at a concert. Some of the lyrics to Tess' earlier works seem almost bitter. But that's understandable, considering her age. Heck, she was 17 when Sixpence recorded TBM.
Well, Tess is all grown up now and since her last release she has moved to Germany and gotten married. Snide, downer Tess is gone, replaced by this downright sophisticated lady who has released one of the most mature albums I've ever heard. Also gone are the old pseudonyms. It's just "Tess Wiley" now, like she's ready to take full responsibility for whatever comes from here on out.
Lucky for Tess, flaws are nonexistant on Rainy Day Assembly.
The fact this album is so much better and more mature than any of Tess' other work is ironic because this album IS all of her older works. She just took a bunch of songs she's already released and added lush instrumentation, better vocals, and subtle lyric changes when necessary. And that's the brilliance of the album. She took the jumbled, disjointed mass of songs she's released in the last 5 years and turned them into an ALBUM. Many of the songs were actually better before than the album verions, but this album must be taken as a whole, and given your full concentration, to be appreciated. To understand the incredible changes these songs (along with Tess herslef for that matter) have undergone you have to stop and think.
Take Untitled for example. This song, actually relatively unchanged from its original verion (an unspectacular ballad on the Sings With Teenagers EP), is the best song I've ever heard. The contrast to its former self is amazing. Originally, the song was OK, maybe a little predictable (oh, look, there's another "Tess explosion" at the end... didn't see THAT coming) with allright vocals on Tess' part, kind of boring at the beginning... But what bothered me most about it was its POTENTIAL. This song could have been great. It seemed like she [made it bad] it up. But now, the album version, with its subtle changes (its slower, has a piano added and some amazing vocals from Tess) is simply spectacular. It's the climactic point of the album. But most improtantly, you can see that it's a song about losing control. While Tess sings about a growing suspicion she has of a boyfriend's former lover, the song grows to a huge explosion of guitars and bass, followed by anguished non-lyrical vocals from Tess to end the song. That stayed the same. But originally the song was too fast, too driving. It still had a sense of control. Now, with almost no driving percussion beat, the song is completely unpredictable and uncontrollable. And the almost nonsensical, but beautiful piano strains following Tess' voice make the song. Thrown in with the guitars at the final climax, they are almost inaudible, but the song is all the better for them.
And that's the story of Rainy Day Assembly after all. It was the subtle changes that made 10 above average indie songs into a brilliant album by a brilliant singer-songwriter."

Showcase for a Hidden Talent

matt_suffern | Chapel Hill, NC | 05/14/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

""Disconnect" on Sixpence's This Beautiful Mess showed signs of the promise to come. After a long journey through the music underground, Tess is back with flawless production and an outstanding array of songs. Her voice is ethereal and unique and often layered to perfectly compliment the guitar work. This singer/songwriter defies comparisons; suffice it to say that while the sound is undeniably soft, her open-faced lyrics and the intricacy of the arrangements give the music a substantial quality so often lacking in music of the genre. An example is near the end of "Something Sweet and Real," where accents of horns are brought in to supplement the basic hook. On many other albums they would be overdone and overbearing, but in this case they merge with the guitar sound to perfection. The album is definitely worth a listen. There are few artists today more deserving of success."

Saw her live

Richard J. Graf Jr. | Oceanside, NY United States | 01/05/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"she played Pete's Candy Store in Brooklyn on 1/2/04, with just an acoustic guitar and her voice, and I was whisked away for an hour or so on a beautiful, honest, personal, musical, spiritual journey. bought the CD at the show for the hour-long drive home, and the journey continued. can't stop listening to CD. this review is over, now GET THE CD! i assure you that you'll be finding it worth your while to come back and leave a positive review also"