After four albums that garnered regular (and not unwarranted) comparisons to both
Cat Power and
PJ Harvey, British born, Oregon based singer/songwriter
Scout Niblett has turned her sights to something a bit more exploratory. Throughout
This Fool Can Die Now, there's a subtle but unmistakable experimental feel very much akin to
Scott Walker's more recent albums, such as
Tilt and
The Drift. Of course, it's not as if these 14 songs sound like
Walker -- no one sounds like
Scott Walker but
Scott Walker -- but there's a similar fascination with minimalism, repetition, and dramatic dynamic shifts, and throughout this album,
Niblett experiments with her vocal phrasing and range in a very
Walker-like fashion, veering unexpectedly from a flirtatious coo to raw, throaty shrieking to a
Karen Dalton-like folk-blues wail. The resulting songs aren't completely foreign to
Niblett's longtime fans -- the opening "Do You Want to Be Buried with My People?," a duet with
Will Oldham, is familiar countrified alt folk -- but there is a bracing fearlessness to
This Fool Can Die Now that finally fully differentiates
Scout Niblett from the rest of the "weird folk" boomlet.