Happy 15th Anniversary to Amel Larrieux’s third studio album Morning, originally released in the UK April 21, 2006 and in the US April 25, 2006.
Imagine you could capture the nirvana of that interim state between asleep and awake. Aware you’re not in a dream, but still shielded by sheets, a comforter, partner, or whatever you wrap around to shield yourself from the demands of a grown-up day. That’s the sensation crystallized within the title song of Amel Larrieux’s third solo effort Morning.
The temperature is ideal with not too much sun in the room as “Morning” opens its eyes a little on its bridge (“Fear, you're not wanted here / Hitch a ride with a tear wash away then / Light is what I yearn for / If it’s behind that door, then let me break it”). Thereafter, she weaves a quilt of pastel vocals that coo, yawn, and stretch like a tabby cat.
On Morning, Larrieux writes love and pain so well, both become pleasure. As with any set from her, each song encapsulates a feeling. This collection is a curio arranged with intricate, detailed figurines representing allure (“Trouble,” “Earn My Affections”), resilience (“Just Once,” “Magic”), oppression (“Weary,” “Gills and Tails”), resolve (“Morning”), neurosis (“Unanswered Question,” “Mountain of When”), and devotion (“No One Else”).
However, most radio and video outlets were only exposed to the single “Weary,” a glimpse into women’s experience of navigating a world gripped too tightly by men. The downtempo hip-hop track could have comfortably hosted 16 bars from a male rapper, but needed no such input to appeal to Larrieux’s fanbase.
Alternative version of album artwork designed by Mark Chappelle
Just as an aside, if you’ve ever wondered why Morning has dual album covers, I can explain because I designed both. Originally, the image of Larrieux against a blue sky was chosen. When “Weary” was released, the accompanying promotional efforts used this artwork to herald the forthcoming album. Between then and the release date though, the label manufactured CDs with the yellow image, but the blue was already circulating online.
That lead single generated buzz, but the sprightly, succinct “Trouble” was truly electric. Radio perfect with its skipping, samba heartbeat, it finds Larrieux spilling youthful vocals everywhere, infatuated in multiple languages (“Me nah ac’ a fool for nobody / Lord have mercy on me / Qu'est que tu me fais, cherie!”). The fun extends all the way to the song’s edge with Larrieux improvising a winsome, vocalized trumpet flourish.
Flirty and grown is the vibe on “Earn My Affections,” a spacious track furnished with minimal percussion, and subterranean bass. Here, Larrieux teaches a soulful lesson on how to set an aloof suitor straight. She’s having none of the too-cool posturing and blooms with imperatives: Earn it. Put your back into it. Act right. Little is left to say but, “Yes, ma’am.” If you listen carefully, you may notice her usually silent partner, producer Laru Larrieux, wedging his voice quietly beneath his wife’s.
When she’s not getting you together, Larrieux dabbles in alchemy. For “Unanswered Question,” she extracts regret from a romantic miscarriage and turns it golden. Anyone who’s been abandoned with no closure can testify to its intense bitterness, but she turns that acrid taste savory, irresistible. A Möbius strip of prismatic chords powers the exploration. She wrote those chords—that’s Larrieux on piano. A savvy ear may recognize the jazzy toms from “Sweet Misery” (2000), now stretched and strewn, artful and haphazard, crushed into the beat.
The second verse outlines her conundrum, “The back-and-forth, the on-and-off / The ‘don’t call anymore’ / The leaving, the wishing I had stayed / A self-inflicted prison I won’t escape / Like if I did, the memories would decay.” I felt she found my letters and read each one out loud. The way she frames this catch-22, this familiar ambivalence, it becomes photorealistic. In these moments, her keen sense as a writer outshines her more than ample capability as a vocalist.
As astounding as that song is, there is no finer moment on Morning than the warm melancholy of “Gills and Tails.” Larrieux excels at allegory here, wielding Neptunian metaphors like an aquatic goddess. Her lyrics are visual, tactile. You see the ripples and feel the mist as you turn your face away from a splash: “I looked at my reflection in the water / thought, ‘What an unlikely pair’ / Closed my eyes, held my breath, plummeted down, down, down / and anchored myself there / Can't tell how long I've been / in the company of gills and tails / I think I feel my skin / growing scales.”
This song’s figurative questions have become horrifyingly literal since 2006. Eric Garner’s last words of “I can’t breathe” became a rallying cry for those protesting his 2014 death, and again during upheaval in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd. The “Gills and Tails” analogy of being a little fish in a big pond illustrates the burden of oppression in general. But given some of the horrors of the last decade, it just “hits different” to hear the repeated ask of “Can I come up for air? Can I come up?”
Larrieux’s songcraft turns outré on the intentionally unpretty “Mountain of When.” Employing a sinister sound bed, menacing ominously through a clangor of cymbals, it depicts the stark nuisance of overthinking and self-doubt (“Predicting the loss before I begin / So it don’t cut too deep when I don’t win / I hate it when I’m right / Much rather be wrong / I’d rather be wrong”). The recursively echoing voices portrayed are a surprisingly vulnerable moment of self-disclosure. Having negative inner chatter isn’t just for creatives like me. Larrieux fights it too.
If levity is then needed, lean back toward the affirmative “Just Once.” It’s a nursery rhyme up top, and deconstructed George Clinton “Atomic Dog” down bottom. Previously a Japanese bonus track on Bravebird (2004), it gets upcycled for a second life on Morning.
Another unlikely bright spot, “Magic,” is a sonic grab bag of blips, sirens, and a low-grinding organ mimicking the neverquietness of city life. Larrieux turns this audio oddity into a soapbox from which she sermonizes about economic justice. Given the setup, you wouldn’t expect the bleak, atonal song to end in ebullience, celebration, and a spirited appearance from her daughters Sky and Sanji-Rei.
Much like Kenny Lattimore’s “For You” or Luther Vandross’ “Here and Now,” Larrieux had her own modern soul classic everyone wanted to walk down the aisle to with “Make Me Whole” (2000). Drawing from the same well, she pours out another resplendent ballad about enduring love: “No One Else.” With charm unmatched, it describes a partnership that’s not perfect, but perfect for the people in it. Starting solely with piano and voice, it fleshes out with the confidence of a new jazz standard. The song is peak “relationship goals” and more than deserved its spot on the soundtrack of Tyler Perry’s Why Did I Get Married. People don’t just want to hear “No One Else”—they hope to live it.
Morning contains so many artistic peaks that even without a big commercial single like “Tell Me” or “For Real,” it reached #8 R&B and #5 Indie—the highest Billboard chart rankings for any of her albums. Excepting the following year’s Blossom Dearie-esque jazz collection Lovely Standards, Morning was the least time Amel Larrieux fans have had to wait between albums. Her next opus Ice Cream Everyday wouldn’t arrive until 2013. As it stands, nearly eight years have elapsed since then, with almost no communiqué from the artist.
My hope is that in her creative abeyance, she is somewhere taking rest and enjoying great art that illuminates the self and the human condition. It’s only right that she should receive back what she’s given. These ten cuts, from love songs to laments, have yet to be eclipsed. Their sound and sentiment have hardly aged. They still carry relevance. They still read my letters out loud. Morning is still now.
LISTEN: