FEATURE:
Vinyl Corner
Macy Gray - On How Life Is
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I did say that I would include…
PHOTO CREDIT: Giuliano Bekor
an album this week that was affordable and easily obtainable. Next week, I am featuring an album that is available at Rough Trade and was released fairly recently. This week, I was eager to include Macy Gray’s debut album, On How Life Is. The albuim was released on 1st July , 1999 - it became Gray's best-selling album to date, selling 3.4 million copies in the United States and seven million copies worldwide. One can buy it on vinyl new or used. Go to Discogs too for a range of princes. Though it may be a bit pricey grabbing On How Life Is on vinyl, it is well worth it. The album is fantastic and, though Gray herself may not feel it is her best album (more on that later), it is a tremendous album that I have been hearing played on the radio a bit recently. I think that, sadly, some people have forgotten artists like Macy Gray. When On How Life Is was released in 1998, I know there was this buzz of excitement. Not only is Gray’s voice singular and powerful; the songs on her debut album are so soulful and confident. I am going to bring in a couple of articles around the album. First, I want to source from Albumism. They looked back on On How Life Is on its twentieth anniversary in 2018:
“Macy Gray was now standing on the world stage as the most prominent face of the neo-soul movement; her only rival at this time was Lauryn Hill who had achieved a similarly dizzying ascent to public renown with her first solo outing, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill (1998).
This pathway to Gray’s stardom began unassumingly enough in Canton, Ohio where the vocalist and writer was born Natalie McIntyre in 1967; a childhood bicycle accident led a then-six-year old McIntyre to discover a neighbor’s mailbox inscribed with the name of “Macy Gray.” Unconsciously, she filed the appellation away, not knowing that later it would operate as the designation for the persona she’d employ in her recording career.
As a young woman, Gray departed the Midwest to pursue her higher education (through scriptwriting) at the University of Southern California in the mid-1980s; this, by chance, got her going as a songwriter, a medium she excelled in. At the start of the 1990s, Gray soon found herself moonlighting in several bands in Los Angeles. As the decade wore on, Gray fielded a plethora of opportunities and setbacks—personally and professionally—in quick succession until she finally acquired a deal with Epic Records in 1998. All her adventures became the thematic crux for On How Life Is when the sessions for that album began.
It is Gray’s voice that irrefutably fuels the lyrics and music of On How Life Is. Her scratchy, whiskey rich tones infuse “A Moment to Myself” with an esoteric edge and apply conventional melodic sheen to “Still,” two standout performances that highlight the unflinching honesty of a woman with tales to tell. Undoubtedly, Gray’s voice brought the lion’s share of attention to On How Life Is upon its reveal in 1999. It became a point of appeal for many who outnumbered those that dared to deride its uniqueness”.
Opening with the amazing tracks, Why Didn't You Call Me and Do Something, On How Life Is wastes no time in getting under the skin! At ten tracks, the album might sound quite brief and concise, though Gray allows some of the tracks to unwind and expand (seven of the ten tracks are four minutes or longer).
I am going to finish with an article where Macy Gray discussed On How Life Is and her feelings. Beforehand, I want to introduce a review. AllMusic wrote the following when they reviewed the album:
“Macy Gray is such an assured, original vocalist that it's hard to believe On How Life Is is her debut album. She recalls a number of other vocalists, particularly jazz singers like Billie Holiday and Nina Simone, but she is unquestionably from the post-hip-hop generation, which is evident not just from the sound of the record, but the style of her songwriting, which is adventurous and unpredictable. Thankfully, she's worked with a producer (Andrew Slater, who pulled a similar trick with Fiona Apple's debut, Tidal) that lets her run wild and helps her find sounds that match her ideas. That's not to say that On How Life Is is a perfect album -- at times, Gray attempts more than she can achieve -- but it's always captivating, even during its stumbles. And when it works, it soars higher than most contemporary R&B”.
It is surprising that there are not more reviews online for On How Life Is. I guess many are archived and, as they were in print in 1998, they have not been made available on the Internet. Regardless, On How Life Is won a lot of praise and is considered a fantastic album. It is definitely one I would advise people to seek out and spend time with – if you can find it on vinyl and enjoy it on that format then I think the sonic benefits will be evident.
In 2013, Macy Gray spoke with The Guardian about her debut. It is clear that she learned quite a lot whilst making the album:
“Making my first record, On How Life Is, was cool because I wasn't expecting anything from it. I'd made a record before on Atlantic [Records], and nothing happened with it – I ended up getting dropped from the label. So this time around, I was on a new label, with a whole bunch of new musicians, and I had no expectations at all. That's a really awesome place to be when you make a record: there's no disappointment, and everything you do feels like a surprise.
It's not the best record I've ever made, but it's really good. I'm a much better singer now – that's come with touring, and of course all the drinking and smoking has helped, too. But I wouldn't want to change the vocals – they suit that record, and where I was at that time. There's a great energy to them; you can hear that I'm new to this game. I learned so much in making it: how to use mics, how to make things sound right, how to work with other musicians. How to make records properly, basically.
The sound we were making was really something new and different – the idea was to take an R&B record and make it with live music, so you got R&B mixed with a rock'n'roll sensibility. In trying to make that sound work, I learned about the importance of always taking my music to another level – to keep pushing 'til your music moves you, 'til it really means something”.
Go and check out an amazing record that, to me, ranks alongside the best of the 1990s. There is no stopping the wonderful Gray. 2018’s Ruby ranks alongside her best albums. Ten studio albums in and she is not letting the quality drop! The more one listens to On How Life Is , the more you understand what…
A sensational debut it is.