God and the FBI, provisionally titled In Dog Years I'm Dead,[4] is the seventeenth studio album by American singer-songwriter Janis Ian, originally released in 2000 by Windham Hill Records. The album's ultimate title, and the theme of its opening title song, dates from a decade before its release when Ian requested that the FBI files of her parents, who were passionate black civil rights activists, be released to her.[5]
Background
At the time of her making God and the FBI, Ian thought this would be her final album because of poor record sales since her return to recording in the middle 1990s,[4] and her realisation that she could not survive upon playing benefit concerts for causes like Zero Population Growth.[6] Consequently, Ian abandoned the commercial pretensions of previous releases, doing a large portion of the sessions in-house rather than in a studio, and doing ten songs with a single band. Ian did, however, return to working with co-producer John Jennings, who had produced her 1995 album Revenge. Ian stated her hopes that the record could become her fourth comeback album.[7]
Writing and recording
Shortly before she began writing the album, Ian obtained FBI files on her parents and learned that her family had been under surveillance since 1950, before she was born.[8] It had taken Ian ten years to obtain the records via the Freedom of Information Act, until she eventually obtained them "through side channels."[7] Among her family's experiences were the FBI tapping their phone and discouraging schools from hiring or granting tenure to her music teacher father.[7][9] The investigations ultimately uncovered nothing.[8] Ian wrote the songs as she read the files but commented that her goal was not "to make this whole concept album about the FBI. I don't think the FBI warrants that much attention".[8] She also cited science fiction as an influence on her songwriting for the album, as well as for that of Breaking Silence.[10]
Ian recorded the album in a house in Los Angeles, with the goal of making it as "bunkerlike" as possible.[7] Ian played guitar, piano, and banjo, as well as handling the string and vocal arrangements, while enlisting collaborators including Phillip Clark, Jim Cregan, Marc Moreau, and Chet Atkins.[7] The former three learned some Latin in order to sing the requiem for "On the Other Side".[7] While writing one track, "Memphis", Ian reported finding herself "stuck", so she called fellow singer-songwriter Deana Carter for advice. Carter is credited as a co-writer on the song.[7] Ian and Clark listened to many Brazilian records, particularly from the 1960s Bahia movement, while writing and recording "Murdering Stravinsky".[7]
Composition
The album's opening, title track was inspired by Ian's family's experiences in the 1950s and 1960s, particularly her father's experiences with the FBI.[11] Ian commented that that "the song really came from what my father went through [...] I thought I’d turn it into something funny or laughable".[12] One of its verses includes the lyrics "Stay flat, don’t rat/What’s a proletariat/Stalin was a democrat, Washington is where it’s at/Every politician is a sewer of ambition/Hide me, hide you, better hide the baby too/We demand an interview/How long have you been a Jew?/We can make you testify/Freedom is no alibi".[12] The song is styled as a 1980s rock song, with Guardian journalist Robin Denselow deeming it "angry but jaunty".[13][14]
"On the Other Side" discusses death and includes drum machines and requiem in Latin.[7][13] "Memphis", a duet with Willie Nelson, is a country ballad co-written with Deana Carter.[13] "Boots Like Emmy Lou's" is a Dixieland-styled tribute to female country artists including Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn, and Dolly Parton.[13] The song "Play Like a Girl" discusses the experiences of girls in male-dominated fields such as sports and rock music.[9] It includes the lines "I remember when boys told me you play like a girl / It's a matter of genetic history / You can't be in our band you don't play like a man".[7] Ian has called the track "Murdering Stravinsky", which contains the lines "We're murdering Stravinsky, shooting at Ravel/Burying Picasso, slaughtering Caetano", "the musician's Lord of the Flies".[7] It targets subjects from throughout history, including the Bible and Bob Dylan.[7]
The Washington Post music critic Geoffrey Himes called God and the FBI "neither Ian's best album nor her worst, but [...] her most diverse".[13]
In a single review of the single "Jolene", Billboard commended the track's jazz stylings and songwriting and suggested that both longtime Ian fans and new listeners could appreciate the song, concluding, "Nice going, Janis."[16]
Legacy
In 2002, John Stroud of the Glenwood Springs Post Independent suggested that the album, especially the title track, took on new relevance in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks "era of Big Brother profiling".[12] Regarding the new resonance of the song, Ian remarked that "It’s interesting how songs do that", and remarked that she hadn't intended for God and the FBI to be more political than her previous work.[12] In 2022, PopMatters' Charles Donovan ranked the album as Ian's tenth-best, remarking that "If any of her second comeback-era albums had the power to break through, it was this one".[11]
^Krochak, Gerry (August 17, 2000). "Ian charting her own course". The Leader-Post. Regina, Saskatchewan. p. D3.
^Levinson, Arlene (April 8, 1999). "Never "Society's Child", Janis Ian Still Unstoppable After Three Decades". Daily News-Journal. Murfreesboro, Tennessee. p. 2D.
^Bouley II, Charles Karel (February 19, 2000). "Ian's At 17 with Windham Hill Set". Billboard. Vol. 112, no. 8. pp. 14, 19. Retrieved November 20, 2023.
^"Reviews & Previews: AC". Billboard. Vol. 112, no. 16. April 15, 2000. p. 25. Retrieved November 20, 2023.
^Kort, Michele (May 9, 2000). "Under Surveillance". The Advocate: 60. Retrieved November 20, 2023.
