Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Time can often be a cruel and harsh master, however when it is feeling benevolent, perhaps even verging in the circumspect glow of long-distance memories. It can lead to the sense of wonder, a sense of finery in art which had been neglected, not through the fault of the artist as they don’t control the honest fickle nature of the public, nor the bare-faced cheek of executives and moguls who only see an artist’s worth by what they can gain in hard currency, but through the aspect of understanding that despite Time playing hardball and even hard to get, an artist can still demand the listener’s own perspective as they urge them to take Pieces Of Me.
Pop Music is perhaps always going to be thought of as the sole preserve of the young and their take on modern life, the bitterness felt, the glory, however fleeting, they receive, but Pop as an entity has its place across all ages, we don’t move onto different genres and bypass completely that which once thrilled us, we don’t suddenly become immune to the charm which once took us by the hand and kissed our souls awake in early pre-teen years. If that was the case the market for nostalgia wouldn’t exist and our memories would never act as a gateway drug to the release of endorphins when we catch ourselves singing a line from a long-forgotten oldie.
It is when a more established artist who once dominated the charts, who gave the world a different perspective to the thought of teen idol, returning as a seriously enlightened woman over the course of the last 25 years, who still holds the gaze of remarkable respect for all she has achieved and to whom pieces of her soul are worth more than arguably many of the thought of stars today who sell more than the identity of sex, they sell an image that is corrupted and tainted by mass media.
Tiffany, more than America’s darling, creatively a godsend to the memory of what is was to enjoy Pop without feeling guilty, delivers her latest album, Pieces Of Me, with a purpose, a resolution, a damned bloody mindedness in which to celebrate the feminist and the female persuasion. Across songs such as Feels Like A Strom, Waste Of Time, King of Lies and Heartbeat Away, Tiffany declares a war on modern instability and the listener is committed to fully embracing the music, and the message, on offer.
By taking pieces of Tiffany, the listener is not substituting the woman, or portioning out of favour the female need or desire, instead they are seeing the building block to a survivor of the teenage glory manifested as a strong individual in later pop form. Pieces Of Me, a declaration of what we can all be when we get stripped down to our basic instincts and then rise higher than ever.
Ian D. Hall