Let’s start with the title. This latest release from Tracy Chapman is called Our Bright Future, which the title track makes clear is an allusion to the new US president as an embodiment of hope. A worthy sentiment, to be sure. Unfortunately, little else about this CD is either bright or forward-looking, and instead tends toward mediocre and/or staid. Let me explain.

Firstly, I should point out in its favour that it’s not completely terrible. The production by Larry Klein (former producer/husband to Joni Mitchell) is clean and unthreatening. Chapman still has that warm and slightly shivery voice. None of the songs will particularly have you reaching for the skip button.  In fact, it’d be perfect for your parents’ dinner party music right after Norah Jones.

But that’s part of the problem as well. There’s just not that much substance here: the songs feel a bit more like half-hearted sketches, or a collation of creative writing exercises. ‘Write a song about love around a vague scientific theme.’ ‘Write from the perspective of the first person on earth, and the last.’ ‘Write about what it would be like if all wars ended.’ ‘Write a song from the perspective of a washed up pop-star.’ ‘Write about spring as a metaphor for hope.’

Which is all the more unfortunate because Chapman has proved to be an above-average songwriter and lyricist. Take just the first line from 2000’s Telling Stories in all its efficiency: ‘There is fiction in the space between us’. Or even the way “Fast Car”, a song you probably already love or loath, there’s a sharpness in the details of the isolation and loneliness of the narrator. There’s little of that in evidence here. Surprisingly, one that does work is the aforementioned song from the perspective of a washed up star, “I Did It All”, especially in changing up the usual guitar-driven mid-tempo for a lounge-y sort of confessional. But that’s just the exception that makes you wish for more surprises.

Otherwise, love is of course the main theme here. Here’s a helpful breakdown.
Songs on Our Bright Future: 11.
Songs directly about love: 7.
Songs where the lyrics are unhappy about said love: 7.
Songs about social/political themes: 2.
Songs about seasonal change as a not-at-all overused metaphor for hope: 1.
Songs about death: 1.
Songs from the perspective of washed-up etc.: 1.
Songs directly about God: 2 and a half. 

The song that’s most explicitly about God is “Save Us All” and if you think I’m going to pick on Chapman here too, then yes, you’re right, and this verse is why:
‘I’ve heard that your God’s older / Buddha Allah Krishna / Manifest with many faces / Worshipped the world over in foreign places / I assume your God must love you.’
It’s a bit of a strange song, to be honest, and it might be trying to hint at Chapman’s perception of the danger of fundamentalist Christianity. eg. ‘Came into the world / Just to save me / But I don’t know about you.’

Unfortunately, the problem with her own thinking surfaces just two songs later in “For A Dream”, from the perspective of having experienced a death in the family:

‘For Christmas and for New Year / I wish and I resolve / But I’m disappointed by myself, Jesus and Santa Claus / I want to believe/ She’s been saved/ And he’s been redeemed/ And it’s alright, it’s alright/ For a dream.’

That is, when you don’t even know with any certainty the person in whom you believe, how can you know the promises that person has made? It certainly doesn’t make for an especially bright future.