Harbinger

Amen Paula Cole's third release is a lesson in sticking to what you know. A trained jazz vocalist, Cole uses this studied vocal styling with great affect. Never overusing her vibrato, she breathes a unique and emotional character into each song with a well-placed whisper, unexpectedly...	Courage With her first album in eight years, there seems to be little doubt that Paula Cole is aiming to shake the Sarah McLachlan-wannabe tag that has hung with her since the days of Lilith Fair. Though she rode the alternative wave during those times to her eventual notoriety, this tim...	This Fire After a promising but overlooked debut album, Paula Cole kept the bills paid with a fateful stint as Peter Gabriel's vocal foil on his 1994 Secret World tour. Gabriel's immersion in richly theatrical, primal vocals only magnified Cole's already fevered attack; it's obvious that h...	Greatest Hits: Postcards from East Oceanside GRAMMY-winner for Best New Artist in 1997, alt-rock singer-songwriter Paula Cole rose to stardom with her signature hit "Where Have All The Cowboys Gone?" from her 1996 Warner Bros. debut album This Fire. The acclaimed disc also delivered "Me" and the smash "I Don't Want To Wait,...	A Few Small Repairs
Fumbling Towards Ecstasy Pre-Lilith Fair, McLachlan had critical acclaim and a cult following but was otherwise just another hard-working female singer/songwriter--one who wasn't blasting down doors with overt sexuality or popping along in front of a male Svengali. Similar in their emotional urgency to h...	Breakfast in Bed On Breakfast in Bed, her first release on Time Life Records (yes, that Time Life) Joan Osborne tackles a crop of hand-picked soul and R&B favorites with equal parts sass and sensitivity. Long an underappreciated artist, Osborne is a performer with the wisdom to exercise vocal res...	Surfacing There's the requisite number of gorgeously melodic and deeply heartfelt songs here--the addictive "Sweet Surrender," the Hollywood-style ballad "I Love You," the sad, profound "Angel," the flat-out spectacular "Witness." McLachlan's not prolific, but this short, bittersweet album...	Touch Nova Scotia-born singer/songwriter Sarah McLachlan was only 20 years old when Touch was released in 1988. This is an impressive first effort, though maybe too earnest in its attempt to break new ground in otherwise familiar terrain of late-'80s synthesized textures. Yet McLachlan...	Detours Thematically, Detours may not seem like much of a detour to Sheryl Crow fans. Her politics pour out of these songs the way you might expect them to if you caught wind of her epic cross-country bus trip, with the activist Laurie David, to promote environmental awareness months pri...

Fantastic
This woman is an amazing artist - her music will send chills down your spine. She is an incredible vocalist and storyteller - you almost can't really listen to her music without being moved on some level. Highly recommended. Don't miss it.

Raw Passions
I've been a fan of Paula Cole since I was 13, and that was 8 years ago. After listening to all three albums (Harbinger, This Fire, and Amen) for a gazillions time, I come to a conclusion that Harbinger is definitely Paula Cole at her best. This Fire is also very strong, but the sound engineer does not do a very good job in that one (especially in Tiger, with all the overload distortions). I admit that I probably listened to This Fire more than Harbinger (and far more than Amen), but musically wise, Harbinger is the one which I think has the most emotional and artistical values. Harbinger tracks are full of unexplainable emotions, like Hitler's Brother, Black Boots, etc. There's a certain higher level of abstractness in Harbinger than This Fire, which is a little more commercialized. There is something about Harbinger that sounds very outdated, yet fresh everytime you hear it. Musically, Harbinger packs with a lot of interesting sounds. The whistle in Hitler's Brother gets to me everytime, and the clapping, beatboxes, etc. really do show how talented Paula Cole is. She is not just a singer with a unique voice, she's also a great composer, a virtuoso, and a groundbreaker. It is hard to recommend this album to someone who only listen to mainstream music, because Harbinger is definitely not mainstream. Some people prefer the crispness in a record, but this is not the case. Harbinger has a very distinctive sound, it is very grey-toned and a little strange. Nevertheless, it is a kind of music that you will appreciate once you've become accustomed to. Buy it.. there's a certain CD in which everyone MUST try to listen to at least once, and Harbinger/This Fire is one of those CDs which you either hate, like, or absolutely obsess with. Do not worry that Paula Cole's musical genre won't fit yours, my preference in music is that of Progressive House, Break Beats, Drum'n'Bass, Future Jazz, Trip-Hop, Industrial Ambience (i.e. Biosphere) but still I think Paula Cole is amazing. Her music is the kind of music that penetrates all kind of genres.

Great Debut
Singer/songwriter Paula Cole comes from the same school of passionate music that Tori Amos & Sarah McLachlan do, and Paula can certainly hold her own against her sisters in torchsong. Her debut album from 1994, "Harbinger," is an excellent album, showing off Paula's emotional voice and songwriting that would later make her a star with her acclaimed follow-up, "This Fire." "Harbinger" has such great songs as "Happy Home," "Watch The Woman's Hands," the great rock of "Chiaroscuro," the dark "Black Boots," the beautiful "Dear Gertrude," and the political bent of "Hitler's Brothers." Paula Cole's confessional songs may not be for everybody, but overall, "Harbinger" is a solid debut disc for this very-talented artist.

Listen to this While Reading "Cowboys Are My Weakness"
I got this as a present, having asked for the album with top-10 hit "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone." I thought I would be disappointed (since that song is not on this album), but I definitely am not. Singable, folksy, pretty, hard, wistfull-- "Harbinger" evokes warm dusty afternoons, convertible mustangs, cool crisp white sheets, and cold bottles of beer. Cole's voice is beautiful but not achingly perfect like some of the latter-day folk divas, which I like. This is a great album to listen to as you read "Cowboys are My Weakness" by Pam Houston, which all Paula Cole fans should read--I think Pam and Paula must be cousins!

Honest
_Harbinger_ is an honest and passionate album, with a bare-boned intensity. Paula Cole expresses the angst of being *different,* overlooked, underappreciated. Each song contains within it a little world that captures a particular essence or quality of some moment of existence where you realize what it means to grow up. Paula Cole acknowledges the little sacrifices, the major and petty disappointments. Overall, this is quite a satisfying album.