Kaki King - Legs to Make Us Longer

Kaki King is whole other breed of musician. The kind that can traverse 8 bars of a treble clef as fast you or I can read this sentence. Of course, there are popular bands that can read music, but I doubt they speak with words like "technique" or "phrasing." The fact that she can transcend her typically outmoded genre to end up releasing a sophomore album on a major label and appear a fair share of late-night talk shows is quite a feat in itself. Her debut, Everybody Loves You, helped Kaki King gain a rockstar status of sorts. Not only did the album contain frenetic, two-handed assaults on an acoustic guitar of rhythmic tapping, slapping and hitting, it was actually palatable as music. Not to mention, King entered the Big Leagues as an empowered, talented and attractive girl. Let's face it; we'd rather see her up their doing that stuff than some longhaired, socially inept male guitar theorist. With Legs To Make Us Longer, King continues down the path she started out on. The ambient strumming of "Frame" sets the pace and immediately communicates King's growth between albums. Then, with the inclusion of drums from Living Colour's Will Calhoun and upright bass, "Ingots" is the first to break the solo, one-guitar form of past material. From there on in the forward-propelled "Doing The Wrong Thing," easygoing "Solipsist," and slow-rolling "Can The Gwot Save Us?" reveal the extent to which King has pushed her sound. King's music is the sound of thought. While pop structure depends on finely tuned formulas and step-by-step process, Kaki King's music streams directly from her brain, through her fingers and out through her guitar. It's probably the absence of the vocals that allows the music to remain purely cerebral, which is why King's vocal debut on "My Insect Life" slightly mars the closer. As the preceding album and following "hidden track" show, King's strength is in her hands. [www.kakiking.com]