Regina Spektor

Sometimes bigger is truly better, and it's difficult even for an indie snob to make the case for clinging to lo-fi upon hearing Regina Spektor's fabulous and full-sounding Begin to Hope, an album from an NYC anti-folk refugee that bears the stamp of a major label. That stamp, however, is only felt on the packaging; the insides are all Spektor's, and hers is a welcome perspective.

Her previous albums are strewn with various styles, most prominently coffeehouse humility and theatrical zeal (some would say overzeal). Begin to Hope is bad news for anyone hoping that she would peg herself definitively as a literary folkstress or an avant-garde woman-child with a piano. Instead, she proves herself to still be a little of both -- and a hell of a pop songwriter, too.

"Fidelity" starts the album with a piano line that is a friendly, well-mannered cousin to the one that kicks off Dr. Dre's "Still D.R.E." Spektor starts into a sweetly sung verse about how the music in her head breaks her heart, then emphasizes the point with a playful chorus that turns "heart" into a 14-syllable word. She's a master at this, making her vocals fit to the tone of her song while taking individual words and giving them personality lifts.

The rest of Begin to Hope is an engaging trip through ambitious orchestral drama ("Apres Moi") and tender character studies ("Samson"), through the experimental corners of chamber-pop ("20 Years of Snow") and driving radio singles with Strokes cameos ("Better"). "That Time" is the only straight misfire, built on a grating guitar riff and straining lyrically to surprise.

"On The Radio" is the standout, a perfectly poppy and accessible song that retains Spektor's adventurous sonic signature and features an especially brilliant and expressive vocal. In a short runtime, it also manages to tackle the big issues -- life, love, death -- in a manner that feels truthful and charming instead of heavy-handed.

Spektor closes with "Summer in the City," a simple piano ballad with fragile vocals about seasonal loneliness that combines memorable descriptions of urban isolation (she half-heartedly attends a protest just to lean on strangers) with an indomitable sense of humor ("Summer in the city means cleavage, cleavage, cleavage"). With about a minute remaining, there's a hint that she will finish with a big flourish, but instead she pulls back and signs off wistfully and quietly. Whether intended or not, it's a powerful choice, and proves that she is plenty captivating even at her most straightforward. - Adam McKibbin, The Red Alert

On Begin to Hope, Regina Spektor treads a delicate balance between her anti-folk past and her present home on Sire Records. Though the label re-released Soviet Kitsch in 2004, Begin to Hope is Spektor's first original material for Sire, and it feels more like a major-label debut than Soviet Kitsch ever did. The album's big, glossy production and preponderance of drum machines and keyboards inches Spektor toward territory that isn't exactly mainstream, but is closer to a more conventional adult alternative singer/songwriter sound. Her songwriting mirrors this, too: "Field Below," which finds her wishing for the countryside while living in the city, has a mellow, appealingly rambling vibe that grows from the traditional singer/songwriter roots of Joni and Carole; "Better" takes the breathy, literate, pretty side of Spektor's music and tailors it into a radio-friendly single. "On the Radio" takes it a step further and becomes a smart, funny, and sad meta-single, with lyrics like "We listened to it twice/Because the DJ was asleep" backed by poppy synths and beats. But even though Begin to Hope's first few songs might suggest otherwise, Spektor is much too freewheeling and quirky a talent to stick to the straight and narrow for the entirety. Show tunes, classic soul, the Bible, and the backs of cereal boxes are all inspirations for the album. And whether she quotes the melody from Doris Payne's "Just One Look" and pairs it with lyrics about orca whales on "Hotel Song," or begins the lovely, confessional closing track, "Summer in the City," with the line "summer in the city means cleavage," Spektor uses them in unexpected ways. She also places some truly surreal, heady tracks toward Begin to Hope's end: "Lady" is a torchy number arranged for piano, saxophone, and typewriter, while "20 Years of Snow" is buoyed along by impressionistic keyboards that twinkle and tumble like a just-shaken snow globe. "Apres Moi," one of the album's most impressive tracks, showcases her classical piano training, her Russian heritage, and those biblical influences to ominous, paranoid effect. Leaving the more unique, quintessentially Regina Spektor-esque tracks at the end of Begin to Hope isn't so much a bait-and-switch as is a clever way to lure in and loosen the inhibitions of new fans. The album feels like getting to really know someone: at first, it's polite and a little restrained, but then its real personality, with all of its charming idiosyncrasies, finally reveals itself. ~ Heather Phares, All Music Guide