Audioholic Media

Ed Harcourt is hardly an amateur when it comes to this singer-songwriter thing he’s got going for himself. His most recent collection of music comes in the form of Russian Roulette, a six-song EP marking the check-point between the 2006 release of his LP A Beautiful Lie and his forthcoming 2010 release.

With the help of David Lynch, Harcourt recorded and mixed all six songs on the EP in a matter of days. Of his collaborator, Ed has said, “Dave is a very lovely man and extremely brilliant at what he does-– he’s a miracle worker.” The same could probably be said for Harcourt himself. The partnership between the two men resulted in an EP that is stalwart and energetic, even at its quietest and most vulnerable moments. What the album lacks in length, it makes up for in the weight of its sound and content.

Each song on Russian Roulette offers a different side of the musician as both a songwriter and as a person. As we mentioned back in March, “Caterpillar” discusses the experience Harcourt and his wife shared when their newborn daughter became ill and they could do nothing but wait with her at the hospital while she became well enough to be taken home. The song offers an upbeat tone on the surface, yet the song takes on a different meaning when you realize exactly what the songwriter is implying when he asserts that he has “declared a war on sleep.”

Though the lyrics on Russian Roulette are rarely cryptic, it’s easy to mistake the message of each song if you’re relying solely on the tone set by the music. It’s an EP that is willing to be exactly what you want it to be, based on where you allow your focus to lie. Harcourt manages to slip some really profound lyrics right under your radar by keeping the words simple and without emphasis. Though it was created as a mere half-step between two full-length albums, Russian Roulette offers more focus and texture than a six-song EP would imply.

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Russian Roulette is currently available on iTunes.
For more information on Ed Harcourt, visit edharcourt.com.