Rules for Jokers

Rules for Jokers

Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com
Rules for Jokers is the third CD from Thea Gilmore, a British singer-songwriter who is equally at home with delicate acoustic ballads and stinging, electric-guitar-driven songs. Gilmore's lyrics are full of dense, poetic imagery, and she delivers them with an urgency that wouldn't be out of place in a punk band. Even when she sings a melodically gentle song like "Holding Your Hand" or "Take Me Home," with its suggestively swaying rhythm, her fierceness is never far from the surface. And when she lets loose and cranks up the volume on "Fever Beats" and "This Girl Is Taking Bets," the words flow from her with a bitter wit that recalls Elvis Costello in his younger, angrier days. Thea Gilmore wrote and recorded these songs when she was only 21 years old. If she sounds this good now, how much better will she be when she's had a chance to see more of the world? --Michael Simmons

Tracks:

Fever Beats
Saviours and All
Holding Your Hand
This Girl is Taking Bets
Take Me Home
Apparition No. 12
St. Luke's Summer
The Things We Never Said
Seen It All Before
Benzedrine
Movie Kisses
Keep Up
Saying Nothing
Inverigo

Amazon.com

Rules for Jokers is the third CD from Thea Gilmore, a British singer-songwriter who is equally at home with delicate acoustic ballads and stinging, electric-guitar-driven songs. Gilmore's lyrics are full of dense, poetic imagery, and she delivers them with an urgency that wouldn't be out of place in a punk band. Even when she sings a melodically gentle song like "Holding Your Hand" or "Take Me Home," with its suggestively swaying rhythm, her fierceness is never far from the surface. And when she lets loose and cranks up the volume on "Fever Beats" and "This Girl Is Taking Bets," the words flow from her with a bitter wit that recalls Elvis Costello in his younger, angrier days. Thea Gilmore wrote and recorded these songs when she was only 21 years old. If she sounds this good now, how much better will she be when she's had a chance to see more of the world? --Michael Simmons

Customer Reviews:

I've been waiting for this..........2003-02-08

...for a long time. Thea Gilmore's US debut is wonderful. If you like folk music with a twist (like Ani Difranco), this CD is for you. She's similar to Ani, but not the same. She has many differences but she is still awsome. I particularly liked Saviours and All, This Girl is Taking Bets, Holding your Hand, and Movie Kisses. This record is great, pick it up.

Average customer rating:

THE album of 2001, perhaps even the millenium.

Rules for Jokers
Thea Gilmore
Manufacturer: Flyin
ProductGroup: Music
Binding: Audio CD
ASIN: B0000658YW
Release Date: 2001-09-17

Tracks:

Apparition No. 12
Holding Your Hand
This Girl Is Taking Bets
Saviours And All
St. Luke's Summer
Things We Never Said
Seen It All Before
Benzedrine
Movie Kisses
Take Me Home
Keep Up
Saying Nothing
Inverigo

Album Description

Third album for critically acclaimed UK singer/songwriter who could be the lovechild of Joni Mitchell & Tom Waits with Bob Dylan cast as the doting uncle. 13 tracks including, 'The Girl Is Taking Bets', 'The Things We Never Said', 'Benzedrine' & 'Movie Ki

Album Details

Ms. Gilmore's Third Album First Appeared in September 2001. Her Stripped Down Acoustic Sound - Incorporating Musical Saws, Electric Autoharps, Overdriven Cellos - Perfectly Complimented her Stunning Lyrics and Crystalline Voice. Includes the Singles "This Girl is Taking Bets" and "Saviours and All" and also the Acclaimed 'holding Your Hand".

Customer Reviews:

THE album of 2001, perhaps even the millenium........2001-11-03

She's a little bit bluesy, a little bit funky, a little bit folky and a little bit jazzy, a little bit rock chick, a little bit grunge (and yet a little bit troubadour?)...but that don't make her any less brilliant. Rules For Jokers is anybody's album for 2001. Thea Gilmore is a wonderful songwriter and this new collection will both hook you immediately and then gradually draw you further in with every catchy one-liner and infectious melody. The lyrics alone read like a poetry book, and then she goes and puts utterly captivating tunes to these astonishing words. There are kicking songs here that rock along and put a massive smile on your face. This Girl Is Taking Bets, with its repetitious hook and mesmerising wordplay, is an absolute belter - one of many, including Benzedrine and Saviours And All. At the other end are the quieter acoustic numbers such as Holding Your Hand and The Things We Never Said that give the album a real depth of feeling. With a list of instruments that include kalimba, cimbala, mbira, Q-chord, slide didgeridoo and accordion, many of them played by Thea herself, it all adds up to a masterpiece. Thea Gilmore is a prolific artist as well. Just twenty one and she has three albums to her name, two released within six months of each other, and even those two had a mini album - check out As If - sandwiched in between. But despite this abundance of material you will not be able to find one weak track.