Anywhere I Lay My Head BY Scarlett Johansson Reviewed by Adam D. Miller    One of the memorable scenes from Sofia Coppola’s 2003 film Lost In Translation featured characters Bob (Bill Murray) and Charlotte (Scarlett Johansson) singing karaoke with some Tokyo locals. Murray delivered a subdued rendition of Roxy Music’s “More Than This,” while Johansson was lighthearted and youthful (albeit a little off-key) on The Pretenders’ “Brass In Pocket.” Based on these performances, if we had to pick one of these actors to record a full-length album, it would have been Murray.Five years later, not much has changed. Johansson still sings like an amateur; she just happens to be an amateur with good taste in music. Anywhere I Lay My Head consists almost entirely of Tom Waits songs, save one original (“Song for Jo”). The song choices are inspired, with Johansson favoring latter-day Waits selections like “Fawn” and “No One Knows I’m Gone” from 2002’s Alice and “Green Grass” from 2004’s Real Gone. Apart from “I Wish I Was In New Orleans” and “I Don’t Want To Grow Up,” she sticks mostly to lesser-known Waits tracks instead of the more obvious choices. Johansson fails to deliver with her debut album, despite having plenty of help from full-time musicians like TV on the Radio guitarist David Andrew Sitek (who produced the record) and the legendary David Bowie, who shows up as backing vocalist (!?) on two tracks (“Falling Down” and “Fannin Street”). But it’s not for the reasons that the passive observer might think. The problem here isn’t that Johansson is a bad singer singing good songs so much as that she’s a boring singer singing songs that are way out of her league. Waits may not be a skilled vocalist in the traditional sense, but he poured his entire soul into these songs. Johansson, meanwhile, delivers them like a metronome, getting the words out with a heavy layer of production disguising her mediocrity. One wonders if this concept would have worked, even if the singing was more engaging. Tom Waits’ songs are meant to sound much more organic than what is heard within the confines of this album. Ultimately, Anywhere I Lay My Head is just another album by an actor who should’ve stayed far, far away from the music business. Records like this are why albums by actors-turned-singers are generally so poorly received, and it will undoubtedly end up in the novelty pile like Eddie Murphy and Bruce Willis’ albums. Don’t quit your day job, Scarlett. |  |
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