Siren, chanteuse, troubadour, songbird, bard.
They all apply to Neko Case.
There are only a handful of singers out there who can match her feminine timbre and fewer still who can keep up with its sweeping dips and dives. In a single second, Case's voice can mesmerize, immobilize and illuminate. It's at once angelic and grim, seemingly too expansive for one woman but too intimate to share.
Case's voice is a wonder, a rarity that would seem otherwise confined to the best operas. Just listen to ""Deep Red Bells"" if you need any proof. Its apocalyptic imagery is made more graphic by her alternately booming and breaking range.
With her talents, Neko Case has set a standard for several genres. She shows what country music should aspire to, rather than what it has devolved into. She recalls the lost legacies of women like June Carter Cash and Loretta Lynn instead of the debased muck of Taylor Swift and Faith Hill.
As an indie singer, she can match the thickest atmospheric sound of a similar artist like Cat Power note for note without getting lost in weepy dirges. Case reminds her peers that sometimes the trick to producing great music is effortlessly making heartbreak sound beautiful.
She'll explore the ""orphaned blues"" she mentioned in ""Fox Confessor Brings the Flood,"" expand on her ""country noir"" sound throughout Middle Cyclone or even make a side trip into electric gospel with ""John Saw That Number.""
Initially, Case seemed poised to carry a country music reputation with the album The Virginian, which she recorded with Her Boyfriends in 1997. She changed hats for her work with the New Pornographers, backing up their power-pop and indie-rock sound. As she turned solo, her relationship with country music grew more complex with the album Blacklisted.
With her latest two albums, Case positioned herself as a preeminent alternative artist at the top of her craft. Fox Confessor Brings the Flood is arguably the greatest album of 2006. The 2009 release of Middle Cyclone immediately brought comparisons, and just about all of them positive.
The woman is stunningly sultry but never needs to flaunt it. In 2003, Playboy picked her as the ""Sexiest Babe of Indie Rock"" and asked her to pose for the magazine. She turned them down and explained she didn't want to be seen as some pretty girl who just happened to make music on the side. If anything, moves like that have only enhanced her appeal.
Her looks are yet another finely crafted tool the woman puts to use. She'll just as easily sport a plain T-shirt as black leather to complement an alluring mane of red hair. Neko Case forces you to stare as she's seducing you to listen.
