Four years on from her last studio album, Juanita Stein is reintroducing herself through a big shift in her musical approach. On The Weightless Hour, Stein massively scales back her arrangements, setting her voice at the centre and letting a healthy amount of reverb help her and her guitar fill in the space.
But while Stein’s arrangements are frequently simple, they are never sparse. Despite the minimalist approach to the songs, the production still sounds full, allowing distant echoing sounds to emphasise what’s there rather than imply what’s missing. This stripped back approach, however, reflects back in her lyrics. “No call to arms / No cross to bear” she sings on the title track with a world weariness.
Whether that fatigue is born of resignation or acceptance is a question of how much agency was in the outcomes. But there is definitely a clarity. It’s in ‘Old World’, Stein’s mournful account of a visit to Prague, from which her grandmother fled the Nazi occupation, and a modern willingness to forget a horrific past. While Stein’s delivery is mostly stoic, her backing vocals are ghostly, and a swell of strings and chime of glockenspiel are a pointed, dramatic moment when she allows something other than her voice to come to the fore.
That sense of clarity is also present on ‘The Game’, a gentle song to her younger self (the one who in her Howling Bells days had to be relegated to ‘women in rock’ lists as though her musicianship and songwriting required the qualifier). “Ignore your instincts / Blink and you’ll miss it”, she sings with a sarcastic calm and knowledge of the urgency that gets young people to act against their interests for seat at a table that isn’t always open to them.
Arguably, her pared back approach on The Weightless Hour is Stein following her instincts on what feels right for now. ‘Ceremony’, the track on the album fleshed out with bass and drums, is evidence that she hasn’t abandoned rock music and could have followed the familiar path elsewhere. The fat, bluesy sound of ‘Daily Rituals’ would have easily fit with a similar arrangement, but there’s more intimacy in her voice and guitar being offset by a skipping synth.
There is a similar heightened emotion to ‘Motionless’, the album’s upbeat centre. Its big, wailing chorus and matter-of-fact backing vocals have a naked vulnerability that wouldn’t be there if Stein chose a slicker production or more complex arrangement. Instead, it’s a marvel how big she can make her voice and guitar sound. She is allowing herself to take up that space.
