My Brightest Diamond – Shark Remixes, Vol. 1-4

Of course it’s with a winking piano on the Alfred Brown-produced “Overture” that My Brightest Diamond’s latest batch of electro-indie fare kicks off. Four EPs of remixes fashioned by different DJs/producers – Brown, Son Lux, Roberto C. Lange, and DM Stith – and the result is Shark Remixes, Vol. 1-4.

A Detroit native — have no doubt this Edith Piaf-inspired indie girl pronounces it “Day-twah” — Shara Worden’s voice is truly a thing of wonder. But it’s largely tempered on these tracks, some of her most operatic passages (save that obscenely high and powerful note on “Inside A Boy”) restrained by the production of four different dial masters. Brown’s offerings are tranquil, low-key. Bell- and string-laden, twinkling. They’re atmospheric, but they don’t do much to add to or change up MBD’s originals. They meander capably, and that’s that – a patchwork of a few of her tracks that ultimately leads nowhere.

It’s Son Lux who shines here. His first song, a remix of “Apples” from MBD’s last album, A Thousand Shark’s Teeth (hence these EP titles), packs undulating sound effects and squawking saxes into nearly six schizophrenic minutes of bliss. Those funky saxes sound copped from Worden’s labelmates, the eccentric band Rafter (hear: “zzzPenchant”). Son Lux injects a lot of flair into just four songs, the fewest of any of these producers, and Worden’s songs more or less demand that brand of dramatica.

It’s true that sometimes My Brightest Diamond can get precious with her language, as when she intones the phrase “You must feel splendid” repeatedly on “The Diamond,” an orchestral yet atypically middling track also courtesy Son Lux. Thankfully the remix artist follows with a frenetic, shimmering take on “Inside A Boy,” MBD’s standout from her last LP. On this Son Lux lets the vocalist take the forefront, with shivering violins and a beep-beat providing suitable tension. Worden’s note just past the 5-minute mark is uncanny. Lest we soon forget, this one studied opera for a time. Son Lux also wins with “To Pluto’s Moon,” a heavy, crunching reworking replete with thudding, dark piano (think Johnny Cash for the electro-set) and a bangin’ outro.

Then Roberto C. Lange’s remixes mark a return to Alfred Brown territory, pulsing and shuddering and moaning in all the “right” places but never escalating. And just that – the build, the swelling of a song – is what Worden does best. Lange’s choices, including “Queen,” revert to the singer’s knack for precocious lyrics again: “If I were queen, I’d pick you up each morning for doughnuts and tea.” It’s mundane and cute, yes – and then it wears thin.

Did Asthmatic Kitty really need to charge four producers with remixing their girl? Nope. Does Son Lux win the mix-off? Indubitably. In the end, it’s those four tracks that are for anyone and everyone – and the rest are best nestled only in die-hard Diamond chasers’ headphones.

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Tagged as: Detroit, operatic electro-indie

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