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Product Description Neko's many fans hang on her impressionistic lyrics, classic pop harmonics, and luxurious voice, and her new album revels in all three. MIDDLE CYCLONE fuses her longtime themes of nature versus man into a shining lyrical broadsword. Numerous guests include M. Ward, Garth Hudson of the Band, Sarah Harmer, and members of the New Pornographers, Los Lobos, Calexico, the Sadie's, Visqueen, the Lilys, and Giant Sand. Amazon.com It’s apt that this record opens with tense, trembling guitar tones: ominous beacons of the gale-force songs to come. Middle Cyclone finds Neko Case--she of the flaming hair and unforgettably tremendous voice--returning to the darkly romantic sound of 2006’s near-perfect Fox Confessor Brings the Flood, only this time the songs are even more fervid and more troubled. Take the title track, a sylphic, heartbreaking confession of love. Case has never had qualms about baring her soul; by now it’s actually a signature element of her charm and power as a performer. And whether she’s declaring herself a maneater (“People Got A Lotta Nerve”) or covering Harry Nilsson (the touchingly plaintive “Don’t Forget Me”), the results are always epic and visually loaded. “The Pharaohs,” for example, might be the best ancient Egyptian-themed love song ever written. Middle Cyclone’s biggest statement, though, is the sprawling, organ-driven “I’m An Animal,” in which Case doesn’t so much sing as brazenly, decisively intone, “I’m an animal / You’re an animal too.” Neko Case’s frequent employment of nature-based imagery--singing magpies, tornadoes, killer whales--only underscores the sweeping, organic quality of her music. -- Erin Thompson