Revelling: Reckoning

by Darren RatnerIt's clear Ani DiFranco never hesitates to swim in a gulf of her own lyrical prowess. A storyteller herself, she takes pride in her tales of heartbreak, society's woes, and life's journey. Phrases like "but the bacteria are coming to take us down, that's my prediction...it's the answer to this culture of the quick fix prescription" hands you a vision through her periscope of the world. But by the time Revelling: Reckoning ends, dimly lit acoustics and funkish groove seem to drag the album through the mud. Its sleepy-time mood with songs like "Reckoning," "Garden of Simple," and "Grey" leave you a little narcoleptic and dejected. Almost every track keeps you in a hole and never hands you a rope. DiFranco's status as a sublime symbol of artistic elegance is well proven through words, but the album could be too much revelling for one person to bear.