After the Indigo Girls left Hollywood Records (and the major-label
game altogether) last year, the duo channeled their feelings toward
recent events regarding the legality (or not) of same-sex marriage into
new album Poseidon and The Bitter Bug. “Fighting for the Love of
My Life” points an accusatory finger at the results of California’s
passing of Proposition 8, while also celebrating “the new revolution”
that has brought so much positive change for gay men and women around
the country. More generally, the R&B-ish “Digging for Your Dream”
encourages listeners to fight incessantly for what they believe in.
Poseidon contains two distinctively different versions of each
tune on the set, and isn’t strictly about the Girls’ outspoken
activism. Several songs talk about love from the perspective of someone
who has been there but still believes in the workings of the heart; try
the gentle “True Romantic” or beautifully written “Fleet of Hope.” Both
Amy Ray and Emily Saliers’s voices sound almost unchanged —
though Saliers’s has become a little rougher — and their
harmonies are as good as ever.
This article appears in May 21-27, 2009.