Amy Rigby, Little Fugitive (* * *) "I don't want to talk about love no more," Rigby sings, but she talks about little else. Whether singing about needy men or her new husband's ex-wife ("the trouble with Jeanie is she's all right"), Rigby has few peers when it comes to the vagaries of post-punk romance. Her cynical tendencies enhance the album's straight-ahead love song, That's the Time, and they disappear entirely in the dreamy, bittersweet Dancing with Joey Ramone. —Brian Mansfield
ROLLING STONE
* * * 1/2
For nearly a decade, this divorced, middle-aged New York mom has been turning out pop-wise confessionals with the consistency and charm of a Nashville pro -- most notably on her 1996 debut, Diary of a Mod Housewife. On her fifth album, she makes pretty, witty tunes out of brutal honesty and some apparently deserved bitterness. Whether comparing herself to Rasputin or dreaming of quality time with Joey Ramone, her biting humor and often buoyant melodies ensure that Little Fugitive never gets mopey or precious.CHRISTIAN HOARD (Posted Sep 08, 2005)
WASHINGTON POST
Wednesday, August 24, 2005; Page C05
LITTLE FUGITIVE
Amy Rigby
In the movies, encroaching middle age often means the end of a career, especially for women. In music, however, age can convey character and authority, and offers endless opportunities for creative renewal. Had Amy Rigby not hit 40, had she never been divorced, had she not been forced to balance her career as a musician with raising a daughter alone (let alone dipping her toes back into the dating pool), the world would have missed out on one of rock's most distinctive and consistently excellent songwriters.
Since her 1996 breakout solo album "Diary of a Mod Housewife," Rigby has embraced the kinds of personal setbacks and frustrations others tend to deny, and her fifth album is no different. "I'm like Rasputin, I get back up again," she quips on "Like Rasputin," the lead track. Whether pondering the disturbing fact that she actually likes her new husband's ex-wife on "The Trouble With Jeanie" ("I even tried to hate her," Rigby sings) or putting a positive spin on the death of an idol ("Dancing With Joey Ramone"), her songs are funny without being silly, rooted in the mundane but elevated by little details that bear the familiar and frank hallmarks of truth.
Who knows if the resonant soulmate sentiments of "That's the Time" or the rueful "Girls Got It Bad" (featuring Rigby's former Shams band mates on backing vocals) are autobiographical or merely based loosely on experience. It makes no difference, since at their most hilarious or heartbreaking, Rigby makes them seem real. They're like mirrors held up for singer and listener to share, carefully polished to reflect everyday life (and all its wrinkles) as clearly as possible. -- Joshua Klein
L.A. TIMES - September 18, 2005
RECORD RACK
Every single song's a keeper
Amy Rigby's fifth album is filled with a dozen brightly engaging, incessantly tuneful songs.
By Randy Lewis
Amy Rigby - "Little Fugitive" (Signature Sounds)
In the successors to "Diary of a Mod Housewife," the 1997 debut solo album that landed Rigby a spot in the Top 10 of Village Voice's annual pop and jazz critics poll, the Pittsburgh-reared singer-songwriter sometimes seemed to be wrestling with the classic how-do-I-top-that? conundrum.
Her fifth album answers that with a dozen brightly engaging, incessantly tuneful songs without a throwaway in the bunch. Her favorite themes — resilience in the face of romantic disappointment, a willingness to try, try again and the value of maintaining a sense of humor — aren't revolutionary, but they're always worth revisiting in hands as skilled as hers.
"Needy Men" puts a bouncy pop-cabaret spin on troubles with the opposite sex, transforming what could have been a whiner into an effervescent singalong. "I Don't Want to Talk About Love No More" is a muscular rocker enumerating everything she'd rather discuss than that dreaded four-letter L word. And she crafts a double-edged paean to '60s pop and '70s punk in the irresistible "Dancing With Joey Ramone."
She includes enough sonic twists to keep her membership in the "alt-" prefix community current, but deep down she remains a direct descendant of the Beatles-Kinks-Byrds pure-pop lineage, with a splash of Jonathan Richman's sardonic innocence to keep the listener on edge.
KANSAS CITY STAR 9/15/05
Amy Rigby
‘Little Fugitive’
(Signature)
★★★
“Little Fugitive” is Amy Rigby’s fifth album. Since her debut with “Diary of a Mod Housewife” in 1996, she amassed much critical acclaim, built a modest audience and made enough money to buy a house in Nashville. Such is the fate of the smart singer-songwriter. Oh, her songs are “about” the same things as, say, Faith Hill’s: love, mostly — its glories, woes and ambivalences. So, what’s the big deal?
Well, if you don’t have a taste for the wry observation or the beautifully nuanced couplet, not much. If you’re not impressed by a musical palette that embraces Merseybeat, folk-rock, punk, psychedelia, Madonna and beach music with taste and aplomb , again, not much. You see, “Little Fugitive” is a poignant example of the fine music that’s produced on the margins of a music industry that’s out of touch with everything but hypothetical 14 year-olds.
The slyly feminist “Like Rasputin” succeeds as self-validation and social critique. “The Trouble With Jeannie” concerns the ex-wife of a present husband, the trouble being that “she’s alright.” The singer sounds as surprised by the revelation as the listener, which is part of the song’s magic.
“Dancing With Joey Ramone” is an affectionate, dreamy romp — cute (right down to the “1-2-3-4” coda) but not cloying. “That’s the Time” has a mature vulnerability that recalls the McGarrigle Sisters. It’s one of Rigby’s rare unequivocal love songs. “It’s Not Safe” echoes “Always Something There to Remind Me” and sounds ready for the next Wes Anderson movie.
Rigby sings in a voice that’s sweet but worn, modest but tuneful — unpleasant, most likely, to the listener weaned on commercial radio. But her songs and her performances brim with intelligence, soul and subtlety. What’s she got going for her? Not much. — Steve Wilson/Special to The Star
AUSTIN AMERICAN STATESMAN October 20, 2005
Amy Rigby: "Little Fugitive"
(Signature Records)
4 Stars
We see snapshots of her fugitive life right there on the CD cover. Like
the rest of us, the woman who once penned "Diary of a Mod Housewife" has
a mess of driver's license photos like mugshots and each song plays out
as a meditation, however zippy, on a moment in time. Also like the rest
of us, she's confounded by life's curve balls but has the resolve to see
them through. The songs do that as well, a set recorded quickly in the
New York she abandoned for Nashville.
But unlike the rest of us - unlike most songwriters, anyway - she
translates her experiences into tunage the straightforwardness of which
belies their emotional complexity. She's baffled by the kindness of her
husband's ex-wife ("The Trouble With Jeanie") but still knows the value
of love over the long haul ("That's the Time"). She's even a bit of a
record nerd, paying touching tribute to Joey Ramone by fantasizing a
sock hop with him to his musical antecedents. ("Gloria" by the Shadows
of Knight/ "He's So Fine" and "I Feel Alright"). And more than anything
else, she gets knocked down, but she gets up again ("Like Rasputin").
Not singer-songwriter Amy Rigby. She's done with all that. Really...
AMY RIGBY "Little Fugitive"(Signature Records)
Amy Rigby wants to talk about anything but love.
"Let's discuss the hybrid car/Let's eulogize the mason jar," she sings on her new CD. Even talking about "roof tar" is preferable to romance at this point.
Yet, somehow, she never manages to get very far from the subject. Though she's snugly ensconced in middle age, Rigby's songs chart the same misconnections, rejections and frustrations you'd expect from writers decades her junior.
She's a kind of female answer to Nick Hornby's lead character in "High Fidelity" - a pop-literate wit who can't shake the dramas of adolescence decades past their sell-by date.
For five albums now, Rigby has been crafting bitingly honest, hysterical and catchy odes to the bottomless pit of dashed love.
Yet she keeps soldiering on. No wonder Rigby compares herself in the opening track to a famously unkillable figure from history: Rasputin. "In 1916 he took a bullet to the head/They all thought that he was dead/But he surprised them," she sings. "In 1981 I withstood a similar attack/I got hit/But I came back."
The song also works as a social critique, asserting that Rigby's role as a single, sexually active woman makes her no less dangerous a figure to some people in society than the Russian bogeyman.
Rigby can keep mining such turf because she's a nuanced enough writer to find a new angle every time, from her exposé of a "Needy Man" to her admission that a fast affair won't heal her ("Year of the Fling").
Rigby matches her astringent observations to charmingly wobbly vocals and plucky pop tunes. Yet the singer's greatest gift remains her cunning couplets. "I've had enough of the soul mate search/I've had enough of the stomach lurch," she sings.
With lines like that, you'll find yourself wishing Rigby's love life would fail forever.
CHRISTIAN HOARD (Posted Sep 08, 2005)