Antony and the Johnsons' second full-length recording, the haunting and affecting I Am a Bird Now, is a far more intimate affair than their debut. Anohni's bluesy parlor room cadence is more upfront here, resulting in a listening experience that's both exhilarating and disquieting. Hope There's Someone is a somber opener, and its plea for companionship, augmented by a sparse piano/vocal arrangement that rises into the air by song's end in a swirl of multi-tracked harmonies, is ultimately uplifting. This formula is applied to much of the record and never ceases to elicit honest emotion from Anohni and her numerous guests. Rufus Wainwright takes the lead on What Can I Do?, a languid meditation on death that conjures up images of rainy streets, lonely lampposts, and cigar smoke -- it's brief (under two minutes) but alluring like the cover of a Raymond Chandler novel. Boy George joins Anohni for a duet on the soulful and empowering You Are My Sister, Devendra Banhart lends his warbly tenor to the lush Spiraling, and Lou Reed plays noodly guitar and recites an anonymous poem on the mischievous Fistful of Love. It's a testament to Anohni's skill as a writer and arranger that these guest appearances are completely devoid of pretense, and while each artist is reverent to the source material, it's still Anohni's show, as the most powerful moments on I Am a Bird Now are hers. ~ James Christopher Monger, Rovi

1		Hope There's Someone
2		My Lady Story
3		For Today I Am a Boy
4		Man Is the Baby
5		You Are My Sister
6		What Can I Do?
7		Fistful of Love
8		Spiralling
9		Free At Last
10		Bird Guhl

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