Rain Perry - A White Album

by Kevin Wierzbicki

At first glance fans could get the idea by this album's title that it is some kind of tribute to the Fab Four's album The Beatles which is commonly referred to as The White Album. Quite to the contrary, Perry's choice of title comes from the fact that she addresses 'white privilege' and the damage it does/has done here. Unlike many artists who sing about society's ills, Perry does not infuse her music with anger. That doesn't mean the songs are not potent though; on opening cut "Melody & Jack" Perry tells the story of a doomed interracial love relationship, and on "The Money," a cut set to a catchy and bluesy rhythm, chronicles how there has historically been great disparity between homeownership possibility for white folk and Black folk. Perry is a great storyteller with a songbird voice and these two songs are graphic examples of how she gets her point across without, shall we say, shouting. "Yarddogs/Morning Dew" is a nice reconfiguring (with added original lyrics) of Bonnie Dobson's "(Walk Me Out in the) Morning Dew," famously covered by the Grateful Dead, and so sublime that listeners might not realize that it is about surviving after a nuclear holocaust. Perry does get angry on "What's Wrong with You?" but still keeps it palatable; perhaps it is best to think of this protest-themed album instead as enlightenment-themed.

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