译Slant评Gwen Stefani 2016年专辑This Is What the Truth Feels Like（3.5

翻译搬运自：https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/qxm1tSYIly4z-Q5VehjbxA

原文链接：https://www.slantmagazine.com/music/review/gwen-stefani-this-is-what-the-truth-feels-like

They say that great writers don’t wait around for inspiration—that they work on their craft daily: Ernest Hemmingway wrote every morning; Franz Kafka wrote in the evening; Maya Angelou rented a local hotel room and worked from 6:30 a.m. until 2 p.m., reviewing what she wrote each night and often discarding it. Gwen Stefani, who’s never been shy about her struggles with artistic motivation, seems to have turned that old axiom on its head. It took a high-profile gig on The Voice to impel her to finally resuscitate her dormant solo career, reuniting with producer Pharrell Williams, among others, for her first album in a decade, before scrapping the whole thing when her 13-year marriage to Gavin Rossdale disintegrated.

他们说，伟大的作家无需等待灵感到来 - 他们只是每天坚持磨练自己的手艺：Ernest Hemmingway每天早晨都写作；Franz Kafka则每晚写作；Maya Angelou在住地旅馆租了房子便于每天从早上6:30到下午2点回顾前一天晚上的作品，勤于删减。从不羞于与艺术动机抗争的Gwen Stefani似乎颠覆了这条格言。她在The Voice演出期间高调宣布复出，重燃本已蛰伏的独唱事业，和制作人Pharrell Williams重聚，并发行她10年来的首张专辑。而这一切发生前，她也结束了与Gavin Rossdale一起13年的婚姻。

That, it seems, was the inspiration Stefani was waiting for. Back in the ’90s, Stefani’s split with No Doubt bandmate Tony Kanal was, famously, fodder for the band’s breakthrough Tragic Kingdom, and the unapologetically autobiographical This Is What the Truth Feels Like similarly wastes no time asserting its status as a breakup album. Lead single “Used to Love You” is as emotionally raw as the singer’s been since “Don’t Speak,” both vocally and lyrically, and pointed barbs presumably aimed at Rossdale are scattered throughout the album: “Thinking that nobody knows, but I got your number, I got your codes,” she quips on “Naughty,” suggestive of media reports that she found out about the former Bush frontman’s infidelity via the family iPad. While an artist converting personal tragedy into creative capital is hardly new, the nakedness with which Stefani assesses the ruins of her relationship is stark, especially compared to the self-proclaimed guilty pleasures of Love. Angel. Music. Baby. and The Sweet Escape.

不过这似乎正是她所等待的灵感。早在上世纪90年代，Stefani和No Doubt乐队成员Tony Kanal和的‘著名’决裂，就曾作为素材成就了乐队的突破性专辑“Tragic Kingdom”，而非常相似的，这张毫无歉意的自传式“This Is What the Truth Feels Like”迫不及待自我标榜为分手专辑。首单“Used to Love You”中未经加工的情绪可与前期的“Don't Speak”比肩，在演唱及歌词中随处可见貌似指向Rossdale的内容:“你总认为没人知道，但我有你的电话，也知道你的区号,”她在“Naughty”中如此嘲弄到，暗指她在家用iPad读到媒体报道Bush主唱的不忠。尽管将个人悲剧当作创意资本已并不鲜见，Stefani在处理本歌中关系结束的坦白还是让人咋舌，与前期“Love. Angel. Music. Baby.” 以及“The Sweet Escape”中自我标榜的内疚快感相比尤甚。

Much of the album is, however, about the discovery of new love. “You’re in so much trouble,” Stefani warns on the standout “Misery,” yet despite the implication of the song’s title, her target isn’t Rossdale, but a prospective lover. “They’re all gonna say I’m rebounding, so rebound all over me,” she sings on “Truth,” and playful puns aside, one instantly worries for the obviously vulnerable Stefani, ever the hopeless romantic, falling all over again. “I can love whoever I want/Say whatever I want/Do whatever I want,” she declares on “Me Without You,” capturing the sense of relief and possibility that can often line the dark clouds of a painful breakup.

这张专辑的大部分内容却是关于发现新爱。“你麻烦大了”Stefani在“Misery”中警告道，虽然这首单曲充满暗示意味，其目标并不是Rossdale，而是某个未来的情人。“他们都说我在反弹，那么请弹到我身上吧，”她在“Truth”中唱到。俏皮的双关语暂且不提，人们不禁立刻担心起无疑已经很脆弱的Stefani，这个曾经无可救药的浪漫主义者，再次在爱中跌倒。“我可以爱我想爱的/说我想说的/做我想做的，”她在“Me Without You”说道，“尽力捕捉一切可能的解脱和希望，试图摆脱分手的阴影。

That track, along with most of the rest of the album’s back half, foolishly tries too hard to recapture the attitude and urban-leaning beats in abundance on Stefani’s first two albums. “Red Flag” is a cathartic, eccentric oddity that finds Stefani tempering her anger with irony, her cries morphing into laughter, but the dated “Asking 4 It,” featuring Fetty Wap, and bonus tracks like “Obsessed” are no more worthy of Stefani’s emotional exorcism than 2014’s stale “Start the Fire,” which was wisely left off the album. It’s easy to chastise aging pop stars for chasing trends or trying to recapture past glories, but those efforts here are thrown into sharp relief by the maturity of the album’s first half. Understated pop songs like the buoyant disco-rock “Make Me Like You” and the midtempo “Truth,” which, rather than blast off, chugs along unassumingly, give Stefani the sonic space necessary to mourn the loss of her partner and dream of her future with a new one.

这首歌，连同专辑后半部大部分歌曲，均近乎愚蠢而过度努力地企图重温前两张专辑中所充斥的态度和城市化节拍。“Red Flag”是一支充满宣泄和怪异的另类，Stefani在其中通过讽刺平息她的愤怒，她的呐喊变成了笑声，但同为Stefani的情感驱魔咒，与Fetty Wap合作毫无新意的“Asking 4 It”以及专辑赠曲“Obsessed”并未好于2014年的过时单曲“Start the Fire”，后者未被收录于新砖可谓明智之举。人们很容易指责过气明星跟风流行或者希望重回巅峰，但这种批评因为专辑成熟的前半段而急剧缓解。专辑中低调的流行歌曲， 无论是轻快disco-rock的“Make Me Like You”还是midtempo的“Truth”，平稳自然流露且毫无激烈情绪，赋予Stefani足够的声音空间缅怀失去旧爱之痛，梦想未来找到真爱。