Archive
PJ HARVEY
Album number seven in a comprehensive reissue series
White Chalk – Demos
UMC/ISLAND
8/10
There’s surely no PJ Harvey album more naturally twinned with its demo form than 2007’s White Chalk. It’s largely acoustic, which means there’s little distance between the songs’ prep versions and final recordings. Most were written on piano and what sounds like an old upright dominates, Harvey’s relative lack of experience allowing her to effect the radical shifts in song shape, mood and singing voice that she was after. On the gently heaving “Silence”, her multi-tracked vocals are already in place – though not Eric Drew Feldman’s subtle Optigan swirls – but with its reverb and emphatic piano, “When Under Ether” sounds surprisingly warmer and more substantial in its demo take.