I Speak Because I Can

Sound DNA

• Rock
• Folk Rock

• raw
• earnest
• poetic

About

Though it was written while she was still in her teens, Laura Marling’s 2010 second album <i>I Speak Because I Can</i> was a testament to how much someone with extraordinary talent can grow in just two short years. After her Mercury Prize-nominated debut, <i>Alas I Cannot Swim</i>, it was clear that the folk singer-songwriter had bigger ideas and ambitions for her next move. For starters, she’d got some real heartbreak under her belt, having separated from Noah & The Whale’s Charlie Fink, a musician who produced her debut. She’d also read <i>The Odyssey</i> and was raring to bring in more scholarly references to Greek myths and gods (on “What He Wrote” she gestures to the Greek Goddess Hera; later on the title track she makes elegant work of an Odysseus retelling from his wife Penelope’s perspective). <i>I Speak Because I Can</i> features a quiet sensitivity with a deeper, more robust sound and production than that of her quirky debut. It deals with the emerging questions of womanhood she’d continue to explore for the rest of her career: What does it mean to be a woman? What responsibilities does being one bring? This is evidenced by the regal and timeless ballad, “Hope in the Air,” which she performs like it’s a final salute at the end of life’s battle. “No hope in the air, no hope in the water/Not even for me, your last serving daughter,” she remarks solemnly. On another highlight, the blustery acoustic track “Rambling Man,” she evokes the idea of a traveling man with only his guitar and the open road for company. As she calls out, “Let it always be known that I was who I am,” she positions herself as a female wanderer. Across the album’s tracks, a listener can find the final vestiges of Marling’s participation in the great stomp-clap movement that occurred around 2010 (Mumford & Sons and their acolytes dominated the charts, and indeed Marling’s then-boyfriend Marcus Mumford provides backing vocals on this album). And yet, <i>I Speak Because I Can</i>—and all the mature flair for songwriting it showcases—permanently set Marling apart from the rest of her new folk contemporaries.

via Apple Music

Tracklist

Credits