“It Must Change” and the gospel-adjacent slow burner “Can’t” capture Anonhi’s first vocal takes and actively benefit from that lack of fussiness-there are even some joyous ad-libs on the latter’s outro, in between cries of “I don’t want you to be dead!” For someone so famously meticulous-she’s attuned to the tiniest of changes in her sound mixes-the immediacy is invigorating. With a band this tight, fleshed out with horns from William Basinski and strings from Rob Moose (whose arrangements most directly recall David Van De Pitte’s laconic lines on What’s Going On), Anohni has room to improvise, stretching her voice in new directions. The latest iteration of the Johnsons consists of notable session musicians, including Brian Eno associate Leo Abrahams and drummer Chris Vatalaro. Anohni’s voice-and its origin story-is powerful enough to carry them alone. These songs sound organic, often like they were recorded live in the studio with barely any reverb, vocal processing, or production flourishes. On this record, it’s not so much an attempt to provoke as an earnest exploration of Anohni’s vocal identity. If it’s daring to make a blue-eyed soul album in 2023, it’s even more provocative to attempt a modern-day What’s Going On within the trappings of blue-eyed soul. Instead, it takes thematic and musical inspiration from the Marvin Gaye albums that inspired that subsequent generation of soul singers. The backward-looking sound of My Back Was a Bridge sounds nothing like a Culture Club or Yaz record, though. It brings a voice so often described as “otherworldly” back down to Earth. My Back Was a Bridge for You to Cross-her first album with her band the Johnsons in 13 years-meets this precarious moment with a gritty record that provides a safe place to grieve nothing less than the destruction of the planet. Johnson shortly before her death, conversations with Lou Reed before his, and her time as a co-founder of the Blacklips performance collective, whose recordings were organized into a compilation earlier this year. She drew on past memories: a meeting with iconic trans activist Marsha P. “And also say ‘thank you,’ because saved my life.” She got together with producer Jimmy Hogarth-known for his work with British soul singers like Amy Winehouse and Duffy-and riffed on a decade’s worth of ideas while Hogarth played guitar. “I’m just trying to be honest about where my voice… comes from,” Anohni told The Atlantic in response to the complicated history of blue-eyed soul. She was raised in the South of England on the slick crooning of Boy George and Alison Moyet, artists who mimicked the sound of Black American soul musicians overseas. So Anohni did what any of us would do: She called her label and said, “I’d like to make a blue-eyed soul record.” It’s an unexpected prompt, but one Anohni hoped would bring out something personal in her voice.
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