Of course all albums worth reviewing are five stars, and every "best of" is so personal as to be meaningless. Cat Power is so insular as to be beyond review. You either feel her pain, or you don't. If you have ever seen Cat Power live, you have been treated to either the most moving or most embarrasing performance of your life-- sometimes both in the same night. Much the same with this album. This is Chan at her most raw, most intimate, most compelling and most distancing. It is almost funny to watch the progression of her career, to see her perform with "famous musicians" and to see her on Letterman. She is ultimately an outsider artist, creating something not quite "art" but rather a daguerrotype of her soul.

there was a time once a few summers ago when i found myself in a room in Tennessee and was more or less reduced to staying there - no reason for it, other than that it wasn't home - listening to this album after having spent the season washing dishes and hearing "Moon Pix" and "The Covers Record," i had a few moments, or one continuous moment i guess, in which it became clear that Chan Marshall's songs were the soundtrack to every empty room i'd ever been in - tension and veiled purity on this album last beyond what's worth talking about - imagine the sound of someone wanting to stay inside, married to the experience of another's equilibrium - and music for the frequencies in-between - the only songwriter next to Will Oldham, Robert Pollard, and whoever else you might listen to - like a fusion of Son House, Roy Orbison, and Sonic Youth - and none of the above.

I was first introduced to the music of Cat Power one day a year or so ago as I listened to Vanderbilt University's local radio station as I cleaned my closet. The station played "Nude as the News" and "Good Clean Fun" consecutively, both of which I found intriguing and compelling songs, and, being no older than fourteen (and therefore having relatively little knowledge of music beyond the alternative-rock realm), I immediately called up the station and asked for the names of the songs and of the musician, scribbling down the answer on an envelope. I tacked this envelope to my bulletin board, making a point of investigating the artist, but forgot about the note until about six months ago, when I noticed it again and requested the station again play those two songs. Still mesmerized by the stark sound of lamentation that characterized each, I began combing the used-CD stores for some Cat Power albums, until I finally came across Moon Pix and What Would the Community Think, both of which I immediately bought. I find What Would The Community Think a more satisfying album vocally than Moon Pix, especially on the two aforementioned songs, and I was especially struck by how similar "Good Clean Fun"'s lagging guitar sounded to old Helium music, in the vein of "Aging Astronauts." To this day I find that the music of this album tends to bring out the finer points of living in the South -- a place to which it took me, personally, over 6 years to at all adjust, being the New Yorker I am. The voice and instrumentation of Chan Marshall seem to reflect the sincerity so often absent from the commercial country music that tends to dominate Nashville radio and lifestyle. This is music for late-summer walks at twilight, for Sundays spent reading Harry Crews books, for road trips in the Northeast. This is humbling music.

In my opinion, this is the best Cat Power release. It is more well-rounded than the others, covering a wider range of sounds. It has the typical acoustic southern gothic tone of all her other releases, but is much more varied, taking influence from the Velvet Underground to Sonic Youth. Nude As The News is the closest Cat Power has ever come to a "hit," while the title track is a beautiful excursion into the avant-garde. The cover of Smog's Bathysphere is also a highlight. Definitely worth your time, this album covers a wide scope of emotional terrain and is definitely a work of tragic beauty.

I love the raw sad funny pretty qualities in the songs here. taking people. king rides by, in this hole, nude as the news are the favs but the whole thing never gets old for me, only the cd itself as an object apparently wears out and I need another one.