This is going to sound like a completely goofy reason to go and buy an album, but I went to get Regina Spektor’s Far purely because of one of the producers she worked with on the album. Seriously. Now, when you take into account that the producer in question is the reclusive former ELO mastermind Jeff Lynne, it makes a bit more sense – not only am I a lifelong fan of his, but any appearance by him on record is a rare and precious thing indeed.
That said, Far is, in places, a much better album than I expected, regardless of who’s manning the mixing console on a given track. My first exposure to Regina Spektor was – perhaps unfortunately – her duet with Ben Folds, “You Don’t Know Me”, from Folds’ last studio album. I thought she had a fairly distinctive voice, enough that I was intrigued, but when I went to Amazon to check out clips of her solo work, her back catalog just didn’t register as being “my thing”. Where Far succeeds, it succeeds spectacularly, and where it misfires, it does so equally spectacularly.
If I have a problem, stylistically speaking, with Ms. Spektor, it’s with her tendency to try to be a bit too “cute” both lyrically and in her vocal delivery, with a habit of over-enunciating words for effect. Once in a while, it’s okay, but it seems like every third song shows that tendency, which is a pity, because it distracts from the sheer beauty of some of the songs where she isn’t trying to hard to be clever. It’s jarring to veer from “Human Of The Year” or “The Genius Next Door” to something like “Dance Anthem Of The ’80s”, which literally revolves around her funny-pronunciation gimmick.
Where she does a straightforward delivery, Spektor’s work is just breathtaking – “The Calculation”, “Blue Lips” and “Laughing With” are repeat listening favorites. Where she only does a little bit of gimmicky delivery, such as “Machine” or “Folding Chair”, it doesn’t distract from her outstanding songwriting. These songs display a great command of crafting a song and, in places, surprisingly mature lyrics.
Where she loses me is with the stacatto, machine-gun syllables of
“Dance Anthem Of The 80s”; which really epitomizes the facet of Far that I greatly dislike, with lines like “You-oo-oo-oo-oo are-are-are so swee-ee-ee-ee-eet”…it’s like listening to a singing Dalek. I don’t mind a bit of musical comedy here and there, but when it becomes grating to listen to, I draw the line. There are a couple of “skippers” on Far – i.e. songs I quickly decided I could do without after the first couple of listens. Maybe there’s something I’m missing from not having seen her live, but the appeal of these songs evades me – it’s a true love/hate relationship.
Fortunately, Far has far more great songs than it does annoying novelty tunes, and on that merit I can recommend it. As for the Jeff Lynne-produced material, “Folding Chair” is one of the catchiest, most addictive songs I’ve heard all year (and Spektor’s humorous delivery actually works here as she delivers a short passage of the music in vocal “dolphin barks”). “Genius Of The Year” and “Wallet” are unusually stripped-down productions for Lynne, where “Blue Lips” is almost a little too Lynne-y. The download bonus track “The Sword & The Pen” is a bit jarring, with its sudden 
dramatic build-ups to the chorus. Still, it’s good to hear the man’s doing something other than endlessly covering “Mr. Blue Sky”. (Spektor was apparently compeltely unaware of Lynne’s ELO pedigree, knowing his work only via Tom Petty’s Highway Companion!)
With repeat listening, though, I really stopped caring who was producing what and just found myself enjoying the album – with a few exceptions.
- The Calculation (3:09)
- Eet (3:49)
- Blue Lips (3:32)
- Folding Chair (3:35)
- Machine (3:52)
- Laughing With (3:13)
- Human Of The Year (4:05)
- Two Birds (3:15)
- Dance Anthem Of The 80s (3:43)
- Genius Next Door (5:04)
- Wallet (2:26)
- One More Time With Feeling (3:56)
- Man Of A Thousand Faces (3:07)
- Time Is All Around (3:05)
- The Sword & The Pen (3:46)
Released by: Sire
Release date: 2009
Total running time: 53:39
