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Since it has been 9 years since Riki Michele's last release One Moment Please, the question raised is has it been worth the wait. The answer is resounding yes, absolutely yes. Produced, recorded, and mixed by Julian Kindred this is a perfect album, there is not one thing wrong with it. The singing, playing, writing, everything is right on track. Michele and Julian have assembled some of the best players in music today, Steve Hindalong, Tim Chandler, Marc Byrd and David Kindred among others all turn in fine performances. Back on the old American Bandstand kids would rate a record by telling Dick Clark, I'll give it a 10, its got a good beat and you can dance to it. This album rates a 10 all the way around. Now, watching me dance is an experience that has brought fits of laughter to more than one person, but I can picture in my mind throngs of kids dancing to this entire project with wild abandon. It has the kind of vibe that forces you to want to move around.

Since it has been 9 years since her last release a number of younger listeners might not be familiar with her work as a solo artist or as the backing vocalist and whirling dervish for the "Worlds Coolest Band", Adam Again. I will say without hesitation that Riki Michele is one of my three favorite female vocalists, the other two being Maire Brennan and Joann Hogg. Michele has a voice that is pure, sweet and sensual all at the same time. She has written or co-written every song on the album and her talent as a writer is just as profound as her vocal abilities. I assume that by the time this album hits the stores it will have been picked up by one of the big boys bit in the meantime make this album your first purchase of 2002. Check out her web site at www.rikimichele.com. 

By Chris MacIntosh aka Grandfather Rock 1/6/2002
 

Allow me to take you on a guided tour of Riki Michelle's 12-room haunted mansion.  For those who have never paid a visit to Surround Me, I'm referring to her new CD.  Without a doubt, this is the antithesis of No Doubt's Rock Steady (arguably the most fun anyone has had on an album since the B-52s released Rock Lobster). 

Enter at your own risk.  There is no welcome mat or doorbell at this mansion.  The "windows" are as tiny as the snapshots that appear on the front of the CD, discouraging audio voyeurs and letting in only a modicum of light.  Each "window" is framed with rich layers of deftly executed, if melancholic, electronic rhythms and other dark ambient textures.  Furthermore, each "window" is double-"pained" with stained glass, revealing the long-suffering aspect of love juxtaposed alongside a myriad of rich religious images.  Though you'll need to leave the playful side of your inner child at the door, the rest of your inner child may be vicariously rediscovered in this vulnerably revealing rendering. But wait, there's more than meets the ear! 

Go ahead.  Open the door, but leave it ajar, just in case the wailing walls of sound begin to close in on you.  After all, the album was not entitled Surround Me on the basis of an arbitrary whim.  The introductory song, "Mystery to Me" presages the nature of the bittersweet treasure that awaits the listener lingering hesitantly at the doorstep of the musical mansion. "We're finding something unique/something painful/but extremely educational," she reveals in a decidedly cautionary tone.  Anne Hirsch recently referred to term "gift of trauma," and that philosophical recasting of the role of suffering as a blessing seems prominent throughout Surround Me. 

You may want to run and hide, but your best bet is to surrender. "Giving Up," with its persuasive lyrics and alluringly hypnotic musical tapestry may talk you into doing just that. A graciously received gift of seasoned wisdom is offered in "She Said (Grandma's Words)."  The ghost of a distant past will revisit you in "If I Remember," in which she offers "A second of aching."  Just when you thought it couldn't get any darker, there's light at the end of the corridor.  It shines resplendently on "Radiant and Forever Bright." The light fades as you enter the "crying room" in "Compassion." At last, we come to the end of our tour.  While you may have felt "Deflated/crushed beneath the weight of it" there is an exit door in Surround Me -- one that will leave you "hopeful."  "Hopeful/I can see a light, see a light/Surround me, surround me."  As I exit this musical mansion, the light fades, and all I remember is the darkness.  Though I'm now craving a steady diet of No Doubt's Rock Steady and I'm hungry for a generous helping of the B52's Rock Lobster, I shall someday revisit Riki Michele's musical mansion. As Riki Michele passionately proclaims in "Treasure you," "I have uncovered jewels," and each time I return, I know I will uncover more. 

A Shrink Rapped Review by 
Bruce L. Thiessen, Ph.D., 
Licensed psychologist, 
a.k.a. Dr. B.L.T., The Song Shrink 2/7/2002