Tara Jane O'Neil

After playing bass with Rodan, pioneers of post-rock and post-hardcore, the long-respected and much-lauded Tara Jane ONeil has formed bands like The Sonora Pine and Retsin and has collaborated with Sebadoh, Papa M, Come, Low and Ida. Her first two solo albums for the Quarterstick label (Calexico, Rachels, June of ‘44), Peregrine and In The Sun Lines drew great acclaim for a rich musical tapestry The Wire has called “evocative dream music”. Consistently on the move, ONeil records all over the US, from ballrooms in Louisville, apartments in New York to rural cabins. Similarly, there’s a wandering spirit to her music, her songs an engaging mixture of folk, pop, ambience and electronic sounds, tropicana and melodies that span references from Joni Mitchell to Brian Eno. Bones is a collection featuring new material from ONeil, often at her most stripped back and full of her raw, alluring essence. Her delicate, vivid acoustic guitar playing is a feature of tracks such as The Poisoned Mine and Without Push, her subdued, enigmatic vocals floating over the top in airy layers of guitar, strings and piano. Other tracks showcase new directions – her burgeoning interest in electronica to allow for new shapes and rhythms in her songs (the beat-laden, trippy melodics of Enter This House and her reworking of an earlier track, Bullhorn Moon) and found sounds that she turns into hypnotic instrumentals. Bones is rounded off with a few rarities, including two tracks from a 2003 minor-release 7-inch single and her sublime acoustic reading of High Wire, one of In The Sun Lines’ best tracks. Bones is another beautiful step for Tara Jane ONeil in her growing stature as a truly unique performer, out in a class of her own. (Label info)