by Cyndi Elliott
Chicagoan Elizabeth Elmore is better known for her time in the defunct pop/punk Sarge than in her grown-up, screwed-up affair the Reputation, but she's never without heart. On To Force A Fate, Elmore and her savvy Midwestern troupe add torch sensibility (piano, strings, male backup vocals) to their stright-up bash, chime, and jitter. "The Ugliness Kicking Around" - with its primordial beginnings morphing into a barrage of pianos - highlights her sad, sultry voice. As a confessionalist, she crams more breathy poetry and shouting insistence into her lyrics than her younger cohorts, in an impossibly uncloying way. Still, Elmore's angry-yet-benevolent whispers are often a little too close for comfort, and this is what makes the Reputation's feisty, orchestrated pop so powerful. There's plenty of drama to go around: guitar parts that recall Neil Young, Elmore's Elivs Costello-ish way of spitting bitter pills ("Some sad joy you take in staying distant/And you're sure you're so complex/Well tell me what's so novel about indifference").There's sweetness on closer "Bone-Tired," though, a goodbye on an emotional plane with Husker Du's "Celebrated Summer." The reality rock, chased with equal parts rage and candor, goes down like honey.