{"id":23033,"date":"2014-12-16T12:54:00","date_gmt":"2014-12-16T20:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelefortreport.com\/blog\/?p=23033"},"modified":"2014-12-16T12:54:00","modified_gmt":"2014-12-16T20:54:00","slug":"watch-sharon-van-etten-unplugged-and-substantiating-her-spot-atop-the-best-of-2014-lists","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelefortreport.com\/blog\/2014-12\/watch-sharon-van-etten-unplugged-and-substantiating-her-spot-atop-the-best-of-2014-lists\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch Sharon Van Etten Unplugged and Substantiating Her Spot Atop the Best of 2014 Lists"},"content":{"rendered":"

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We’re currently reconnoitering and conjuring and divining our annual Best of 2014<\/strong> lists for publication at year’s end.\u00a0 We remain firm in our belief that publishing those lists before year-end does a disservice to those artists releasing music in December.\u00a0 And truth has been borne out:\u00a0 at the risk of slighting Elbow, The War On Drugs, Spoon<\/strong> and Sharon Van Etten<\/strong>, we will likely make Nicki Minaj’s<\/strong> just-released album our Best Album of 2014<\/strong>.\u00a0 Sorry, just checking to see if you’re still reading.\u00a0 That’s officially sarcasm, people.\u00a0 It is highly unlikely that Ms. Minaj<\/strong> will ever receive praise on The Lefort Report<\/strong>.\u00a0 What the world needs now is Anaconda<\/strong><\/em>?\u00a0 Jeesh.\u00a0 Sorry, got sidetracked there.<\/p>\n

In comparison, Sharon Van Etten<\/strong><\/a> is one artist whose 2014 album and songs deserve to be at the very top of the Best of 2014<\/strong> lists.\u00a0 We don’t know of an album released this year that cut as deeply into our hearts and ears as SVE’s Are We There<\/em><\/strong>.\u00a0 It’s her best album to date (self-produced too) and simply magnificent from stem to stern.\u00a0 We love everything about it, including how perfectly it soundtracked a memorable train-ride across France last summer.<\/p>\n

One of the more difficult tasks ahead of us is attempting to pick amongst all the deserving songs on Are We There<\/strong><\/em> for our Best Songs of 2014<\/strong> list.\u00a0 Amongst the possibles are Afraid of Nothing<\/strong><\/em> and Tarifa<\/strong><\/em>.\u00a0 Both songs are wee-small-hours evocative and weighty in their separate ways, and the recorded versions are unassailable.\u00a0 Thanks to KDHX<\/strong><\/a> we now have stunningly-great, unplugged performances of the two songs, which you can watch below.\u00a0 We had not heard Van Etten<\/strong> perform unplugged recently and were (once again) taken aback by her stirring and incisive tremolo-falsetto (especially on Afraid of Nothing<\/strong><\/em>).\u00a0 No vocoder.\u00a0 No adornment.\u00a0 No anaconda.\u00a0 Just art distilled to its essence.<\/p>\n

Photo by<\/strong> Nate Burrell<\/strong><\/p>\n