Alanis Morissette: Under Rug Swept

Maverick Recording Company

Playing Time: 50:30

D. Malcolm Fairbrother

One would imagine that sales of eight million units of your second work of original material would be pleasing to even the most discriminating of artists. But when your first CD made the cash registers ring over twenty eight million times, that situation might give one cause to worry. Not so with Alanis Morissette, whose first CD, Jagged Little Pill, unleashed the most recent incarnation of this unique artist with powerful voice and a challenging vision of what it means to be a woman at the turn of the century. It also caught the imagination of an audience composed predominately, but not exclusively, of newly empowered young women as it soared to the stratosphere of success, only to be followed by Supposed Former Infatuation Junkie, a work greeted with somewhat less critical favour and commercial success. Although the latter opus was no less ambitious than the former, it was perceived as a more dense and therefore less accessible record.

Before the discerning reader rises in wrath at a perceived error in this reviewer's ability to count, let me be quick to point out that your faithful reviewer dismisses Alanis' first two teen-aged dance-queen records the way an art critic might dismiss Picasso's kindergarten crayon scrawls in any serious critique of his more mature work. And so, Under Rug Swept becomes a signal as to whether the artist has panicked and once again reinvented herself, or decided to stay the course with a 'damn the critical torpedoes -- full speed ahead' attitude: in the sea of her career it seems to be 'steady as she goes'.

The eleven songs are the distillation from over thirty written pieces pared down to more than twenty recordings from which the finalists were selected. There is the promise of a few more of these tunes being released in an as yet undecided format, probably a second, shorter CD. Morissette's evolution has seen her part ways with her confidante and co-writer Glen Ballard; the result of her striking out alone is more or less a return to the styles and sensibilities of her first album with a reduction in the anger and the vitriolic diatribe so predominant in her first work...hmm, maybe Mr. Ballard was the source of the 'angry young woman' image? What is more likely is that Morissette has matured, her anger evolving into something akin to a ferocity of introspection as she psycho-analyses her relationships to find the common ground between her personal emotional status and universal truths.

Under Rug Swept begins with things I want in a lover, a resolute blending of a Personals ad and a manifesto; the piece finds Morissette's intelligent wish list (who could disagree with 'are you thriving in a job that helps your brother?/ are you not addicted?' delivered with determination as the vocal rides the crest of crunching guitar chords as strong as Morissette's sense of purpose: she's more than able to wait until the right person comes along since being solo is an acceptable alternative to choosing an inferior or damaged partner. The list also offers much insight into her character as well, since what she wants is also what she offers. Neither this song nor the following piece, narcissus are particularly radio-friendly, but they are both nonetheless thematically engaging. Besides, Morissette does not so much aim to dominate the charts as she does arouse the imagination of a discerning audience. narcissus (the e e cummings-like lack of capitalization suggests that the singer-songwriter shuns formality for a casual approach) comes closest to recreating the sense of anger found in her earlier work, especially in songs such as You Ought To Know and Right Through You; but the anger is made more palatable by the fact that no one would protest at a little weasel such as is portrayed in narcissus being skewered by the thrust of a fierce lyric.

If you have not heard hands clean, then perhaps your radio is in need of repair, as this song has dominated the airwaves since its release. It is a stunning triumph of technique and delivery wherein two points of view are presented: the male seducer speaks in the verses, while the 'young thing victim' responds in the bridge and the chorus; the effect is further intensified by the seducers recalled words delivered in the the present tense, while his targets reflections blend tenses. These temporal anomalies intensify the autobiographical stance of the song, but the singer cleverly avoids naming names, choosing instead to explore emotional revelations. This piece is also representative of Morissette's characteristically unusual syntax where words are crammed together to fit the melody, and an irregular cadence, distracting to some, becomes her unique signature...but it works.

Morrissette wrote all of the songs on Under Rug Swept, and, given their strength, one wonders once again if Mr. Ballard's previous role was merely to instill confidence in the former dance-music chanteuse as she underwent her remarkable transformation into a self-assured mega-star. She balances musical styles adroitly and is just as comfortable with sensitive ballads such as flinch and that particular time. The former finds her recalling the pain of a relationship four years after the fact; faced with meeting the author of her pain, she chooses to drive away, more out of a belief in her own strength than from fear of a reoccurrence of that which makes her flinch even now. In that particular time and what serves as its companion piece, surrendering, the singer explores the bravery required to relinquish independence to the hazards of love; in the first of these, she analyses it from the females point of view while in the latter song she commends her counterpart for his willingness to risk his emotional safety for loves uncertainties.

Morissette deftly avoids being labelled as just another feminist with a one-note theme simply by unselfishly trying to see things from the point of view of the modern male who struggles to balance his masculine tendencies to lead and dictate in any relationship with an understanding of the evolving equalities and complexities of the modern union. In a man, the singer walks in alien shoes and strives to speak for the male, but her sympathies for the arduous metamorphoses of modern affairs of the heart are clearly evident and more than fair given the history of the war between the sexes. She reminds her fellow women that the product of rage and recrimination is not peace, and nothing good will come of dwelling on the 'archaic reputation' that not all modern men share, or by smearing all men with the same bludgeoning labels.

The concluding song, the land of plenty, serves as a prayer for the survival of humankind in the material world, one more psalm in a modern hymnal; the artist knows that our values have become polluted by a quest for the trappings of wealth so that, blinded by the lights, we do not see the light.

Whether it is the self-affirming realization that 'all these little rejections' become powerless when one finds inner strength and does not allow others to define the essence of her character, as examined in the sweetly delicate so unsexy, or whether it is her idealistic yet fervent hope that the lot of all of us might one day improve, as in the final song of the CD, utopia, Alanis' vision remains distinctive and intriguing. There is enough truth for all of us in her commentaries regardless of our gender. An examination of the past is indeed essential if we are to stride into our collective future with the confidence necessary to avoid our previous mistakes.