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CD Review: The Baroness - Warrior Heart on Love’s Battlefield
by Jordan Zivitz

Co-produced by Slean and Jagori Tanna (formerly of hard-rock fusionists I Mother Earth, and in no danger of typecasting himself), The Baroness does scale some giddy heights. An elegant string section swirls through Sound of Water/ Change Your Mind before thrillingly merging with the dizzy chorus, and the spry pop of “So Many Miles” would have been a natural fit on Day One. Still, most of the album's goosebump moments come when you can hear every quiver in Slean's vibrato. She's always been an intimate singer and pianist, but rarely more so than now.

She still has stars in her eyes; on the moonlit waltz Goodnight Trouble, she watches "late-night planes leave cool white trails" with a sense of wonder, and she's as likely to sing to a willow tree or river as she is to a lover. But she's also a pragmatist. “Get Home”'s gentle touch masks a harsh rebuke, and “No Place at All” indicates there's room for self-doubt in her warrior's heart.

Love is a battlefield on The Baroness. There are few romantic triangles; these battles are for a higher purpose. In “Shadowland”, the album's darkest number, love is "the killer of despair ... the armour angels wear." There's more than one reference to swords, which are always brandished by the heart.

The Baroness ends with one of Slean's simplest and most beautiful compositions. “Looking for Someone” treads the same thematic ground as countless love songs before it - the search for a soul mate. But with a hushed backing chorus (including Ron Sexsmith) and Slean's equally understated performance, it sounds like a timeless hymn. It also nicely sums up The Baroness: subtle, powerful, eternally romantic.

March 12, 2008
The Montreal Gazette