Jean on Jean Issue #38

Jean on Jean (Kanine)

By Catherine Cole
Published: December 1st, 2008 | 12:00am

After her electroclash band broke up in 2005, ex–Out Hud member Molly Schnick took her cello stylings, bought a microphone, and slowly began layering percussion with strings and lyrics. Three years and many Brooklyn apartments later, Jean On Jean’s self-titled album emerges. Themes of change and struggle are imminent throughout the record, but Jean On Jean’s ridiculously charming lyrics and chamber-pop melodies make you feel like she’s sharing a cup of tea with you on a hand-me-down couch.

Opener “Tonight” consists of an optimistic melody and innocent observations of beauty like, “I just sat there and listened / While the rainy pavement glistened.” “Grown” gets a little more into the meat of the record, with a heavier sounds set and rhetorical questions like, “Do things change, or do they just get hard?” Possibly the defining track of the album, “Change” offers bold, relatable lyrics — “I was so tired that I’d gone crazy” — and repetitious guitar riffs.

On “Finally,” the aptly titled closing track, strings hum happily as Schnick celebrates the pendulum of life with realizations like, “Our luck has changed, and we know to hold onto it / Oh finally, oh finally we understand.” After hearing that epiphany, the listener understands a little bit more, too.

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