Track Listing

1. It's Not Happening
2. Waiting Around To Die
3. Junkie Song
4. Ship out on the Sea
5. Dogsong2
6. Rowdy Blues
7. Reuben
8. House of the Rising Sun
9. In Spite of All the Damage
10. Lonesome Blues
11. In My Time of Dying
12. I Wish My Baby Was Born
13. Horses
14. Midnight Moonlight

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #47380 in Music
• Released on: 2003-03-11
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.com
Once again a Canadian perspective helps to bring out the best in American roots music. Like the Band, these three women of the Great North have taken the traditional sounds of their southern neighbor and made them uniquely their own. They inflect the acoustic intimacy of public domain tunes like "Reuben" and "In My Time of Dying," modern classics like Townes Van Zandt's "Waiting Around to Die," and Peter Rowan's "Midnight Moonlight," and their own songs with only the best and most appropriate elements of their punk, trip-hop, and Motown influences. As in the work of Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, you have to listen closely to hear how Frazey Ford, Samantha Parton, and Trish Klein veer off from the past into the future: a soulful melisma wrapped in Ford's whisper, a hint of a funk groove in their arrangement of "House of the Rising Sun," Klein's electric guitar peeking out between her banjo and harmonica. Chinatown taps into the quiet power found on the back porches of what Greil Marcus called "old weird America," and with nary a musical misstep, qualifies as a masterpiece. --Michael Ross

Customer Reviews

Good, Good, Good Tanyas (better than paracetamol)
This album is really good, it's the kind of music that makes all your headaches go away. No showing off, no over-the-top voices, no see-how-hip-we-are rhythms. It's like coming home after a long day's work. I can listen to hip-hop, lounge, jazz, r&b, house, punk, reggae, funk, soul, and everything in between when I go out, but when I come home, this album is the kind of music I want to hear. By the way, did anyone ever mention the similarities with Ray Lamontagne's first album 'Trouble'? Yes, I know that's a man, but the singing and frasing, and even the musical resources on both these masterpieces are very similar. Great Tanyas.

Great music for a lazy summer day
More cohesive than Blue Horse, which was still a terrific album, Chinatown is a great sophomore release. I only got it three days ago, but it has not left my CD player. From the haunting Townes Van Zandt cover, "Waiting Around To Die," to the intoxicating quiet exuberance of "Ship Out On the Sea," and the arrangements of "Reuben" and "House of the Rising Sun" (almost unrecognizable at first unless you are paying close attention to the words), this album is lush and original. The music almost transcends its recording; the songs seem to grow and evolve with every play. Like the Tanyas' previous release, Chinatown is a breath of fresh air in this time of pre-fab music and stunningly uninspired radio fare. You can have your naked pop and countrypop princesses; I'll take the Tanyas' modest thrift-store style and funkyfolk harmonies any day.

The Tanyas Are Good
The Be Good Tanyas's album "Chinatown" includes tough accoustic versions of traditional blues and folk songs as well as some of their own material. The sound is stripped down and spare, with often a banjo being the only musical accompanyment to the three members vocals. The highlights of the disc are the opening "It's Not Happening," "In Spite of All the Damage," "Ship Out on the Sea" and Horses." There are also a couple of hidden tracks that appear after the last song ahas ended. On the downside, the album is a tad overlong, featuring a few numbers, like the surprisingly unengaging cover of "House of the Rising Sun," that don't work as well.

Overall, a solid sphomore effort from a trio of fine Canadian roots rockers.