The Pitt News
23 May 2001
excerpt

"'I know I said I'm fine, but I lied,' Bare Wire's only member Simone Grey sings desperately on Delicatessen's 42-second first track, 'Verisimilitude.' This desperation does not let up one bit during the next 14 tracks of this unusual album that has a creepy way of working into your soul.

"Delicatessen is a sparse, haunting and at times unspeakably beautiful album, perfect for late night brooding after a terrible breakup. Most songs clock in under two minutes, and a good deal are less than one minute long. Each brief track exudes thick angst; the lyrics contain a great deal of pleading with a lover. In 'Water Glass,' Grey wails, 'Please don't break me.' In 'Airport,' she sings 'Please, please hold me... oh God, please don't let go of me here.' The only lyrics to 'Small Unimportant Requests' are 'Oh, have mercy, have mercy, mercy on me.'

"Grey's voice evokes Tori Amos at her most desperate, but unlike that pop goddess, this album is never meant for casual listening. Backed only by an electric bass and the occasional gothic keyboard, the songs have no beat, nor do they have any discernible melody.

"Each track sounds about the same as the next, but it doesn't matter because these tracks feel more like prayers or chants than true songs. In fact, at the start of each track, I felt almost surprised that the vocals were in English; the music sounds so foreign and otherworldly, I expected not to understand the words on more than an emotional level.

"'Court Adjournment,' the album's closing track, goes on for an uncharacteristic nine minutes. But the vocal part stops shortly into the song, ending Delicatessen with several minutes of sparse, moody keyboards and bass guitar. It sounds like the soundtrack to a frightening psychological thriller, just as the detective finds the killer's dark lair and looks through all the creepy stuff he's got there.

"Bare Wire certainly makes great mood music fit to scare the kiddies on Halloween or to play in the background on a stormy night when you feel like brooding. But it also holds some real emotional strength. No one listening to Simone Grey's gorgeous but frantically hopeless vocals could possibly think she's just kidding around. "

-- Melissa Balick

"Get a blender. Toss in the talented qualities of Tori Amos, Enya, Dolores O'Riordan and Sarah McLachlan and you've got yourself a Bare Wire Delicatessen album. It's purely a conceptual album that has to be swallowed as a whole.

"Simone Grey is the front woman on the album with the peculiar vocals. By setting the tone for the entire CD, she creates her own personal style. She has admirable control over the heights to which her dark, angelic voice can carry.

"In one stanza she's exercising her tunes with stirring back-up vocals and the next, her soprano melodies are wandering uncontrollably through space.

"The twist and turns in her voice are quite moving and have the potential to hypnotize and haul listeners on a wild euphoric ride into a limitless void.

"The ambiance of her music begins with the first son, 'Verisimilitude.' The protruding of her voice over the soft pangs of percussion and guitar shows she's having a good time with the song.

"As the music trails, Grey proves again and again that she not only has soul but that her music is soulful. Straight from the heart, 'Water Glass' sounds as if it has the air of a spiritual choir song. Songs like 'Gridlock,' 'Airport,' and 'Curious Foliage' have emotiona power and pure simplicity."

"Grey is just starting out, but her style is already measuring up with the great bambinos. Keep an eye out for her... She has rare potential and is quite ready to surpass."

-- Larissa Theodore

"Bare Wire's latest release Delicatessen spins a tale of love and loss to the listener... this album is enough to relax or sadden just about anyone... The lyrics are rather insightful yet at the same time extremely tragic and depressing... It is such a personal look at a young woman's journey through life that it's almost invasive to listen to..."

-- Katie Gorscak