Rachael Yamagata - Under My Skin

July 27th, 2004 by Rachelandthecity

The new Fiona Apple - blah, blah, blah. That’s how Rachael Yamagata is being sold to the masses. I like her, but I don’t like the sale. How annoying. Just like a Hollywood pitch. It’s gotta be like a “hit” meets a “hit.” Nothing’s original, nothing’s new, it has to be repackaged and resold to us so that we stay in our comfort zone. I guess my point is that I hate being marketed to (unless it’s an infomercial, I lourve infomercials), and if I see it coming, I ususally steer clear. There’s nothing that can ruin good music more than an image. Although, image can sometimes steer us toward certain things that otherwise we might not have noticed. I was with my friend at Tower last weekend and picked up a CD to purchase when she asked me what the band sounded like. “I dunno” I replied, “but the cover is cool.” Anyway, Yamagata is pretty deck, even if she does spell her name wrong.

No, I’m not drunk.

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Posted in Bitter:Sweet

7 Responses

1. zooberries
   

   July 26th, 2004 at 9:29 pm

   She spells her name wrong?

2. Rachelandthecity
   

   July 26th, 2004 at 9:58 pm

   Rachel is spelled R-A-C-H-E-L.

   Thank you.

3. Anonymous
   

   July 27th, 2004 at 3:31 pm

   what’s the proper spelling of Yamagata?

4. Rachelandthecity
   

   July 27th, 2004 at 4:33 pm

   S-M-I-T-H

5. Anonymous
   

   July 28th, 2004 at 1:48 am

   Technically, Rachael is more accurate. It comes from the Hebrew: she is a character in Genesis, where she was the sister of Leah, married to Jacob, mother of Joseph and Benjamin, and all that other good stuff.

   In the Hebrew form of her name, the emphasis is on the last syllable, which, when pronounced, rhymes better with “pale” than “smell,” albeit with that gutteral H, like Channukah, chutzpah, or tuchus. Given that, “ael” is in fact a better approximation of the sound than “el.”

   That said, a more accurate transliteration of all the other names I just mentioned would be LEI-ah, YA’aKOV, YoSEIPH, and BENyaMEIN, and nobody does it like that except maybe the Amish and the coincidentally-similarly-dressed ultra-Orthodox Jews.

   That’s what you get for getting names filtered through three languages before they make it to English.

   This random Hebrew pronunciation lesson was brought to you by the word “tuchus” (Yiddish: “butt”), because it’s too fun not to say twice.

   - Isaiah

6. Rachelandthecity
   

   July 28th, 2004 at 8:40 am

   Did anyone else not get that I was joking?

7. dreamlanding
   

   September 21st, 2004 at 12:13 pm

   Thank you for posting this. I like the song. I have heard about her before but now I think I will buy the record.

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