Send "Tender Forever " Ringtones to your Cell 
| Popmatters |
 If there’s a been a consistent success for Melanie Valera in her work under the Tender Forever moniker, it’s her ability to take the cool metal of drum machines and electronic blips and make them simmer with warmth or, at her very best, course with hot blood. So at first listen, the decidedly darker atmosphere of her new album, No Snare, might seem an all-out departure from the wild-eyed electro-pop she’s given us to date.Really, though, it’s merely a retooling of the skills we already know her for. These songs deal in the same elements: rumbling percussion, tangled swirls of keys and atmospherics, and Valera’s torn-wide-open voice right up front. On No Snare there’s just a new space around it all. These sounds don’t tense up into muscular dance beats, but rather, when they succeed, stretch out into haunting soundscapes. “Like the Snare That’s Gone” is perhaps the best example of this tweaked sound. It’s danceable, in its way, but much more unassuming than “Doves Vs. Pigeons” from the last record. It’s a song much more interested in the sinister clang and clatter of the percussions, while Valera puts together an affecting, metaphor of heartbreak, when she sings, “My heart sounds / sounds baby like the snare that’s gone / and the deep sound goes.” It’s a deeply personal moment on the record, but still surges with Valera’s usual energy. While here and all over the record she sings of what’s gone, of some lack, you can feel her leaving it behind rather than dwelling on it....full text |
| Creativeloafing |
| On Tender Forever’s first album, 2005’s The Soft and the Hardcore, the name of the game was lightness. Nearly every song was like the first word in singer-songwriter Melanie Valera’s stage name: tender. The minimalist indie pop tunes had the overall effect of a glimpse into a romantic 16-year-old girl’s diary. Wider was sassier, a 2007 collection of songs that had some rumination mixed in with the general blueberry-picking ambiance. On her third release, No Snare, Valera nods at past albums, but brings an overall different mood. “The Snare That’s Gone” trades breezy lyrics about making out for heavier ones that compare her heart to a battered snare drum. “Only The Sounds You Make” brings to mind, of all people, Atlanta rapper T.I. with its dark, string-backed production. And like T.I., when you stop dancing around like an idiot, you realize how depressing the lyrics are. It’s obvious she’s not in the most chipper of moods when she sings “I asked myself is it still worth the fight / when the land is blood and the people lie,” on No Snare’s final track. But what saves this album from being a complete depress-fest is the artist’s voice. Imagine Feist French. Valera possesses a similarly silky voice as the Canadian singer-songwriter, yet adds a charmingly-thick French accent. It’s like when you meet a person from Jamaican and are charmed by everything they say, mon....full text |
| Krecs |
| No Snare [KLP217] is less a rejection of things that have been, as it a reconfiguration. Take away the snare and there isn't loss, just a new song. As we pass through the flood of moments that is our lives we make a constant stream of decisions as to what to hold on to and what to let go of. But – even as it changes radically – it is always our life. It will be said that this new collection of songs from Tender Forever is a departure, a turn away from an older sound. To say that wouldn't do justice to the subtle transition of this album. Here we see a songwriter at that most delicate moment of transformation. Holding on to some things, letting go of others; always building a new world, looking forward, looking back, always singing: “I gave it all I got/Held onto everything tight/I know I'm not coming back/I'm not erasing this track.” Melanie Valera's third full length album moves away from some of the more exuberant dance oriented songs of past years into a darker and more melancholy direction. Maybe it's her current residence in the damp and dirty Pacific Northwest, maybe its a little adulthood. Whatever it is, we get a deeper, denser sound. These songs push through the forest as the evening comes, dripping wet, the lights of a little house up ahead. What No Snare retains is Valera's emotional clarity and eloquence. We are always invited to her world, feeling what she feels without exception. Valera keeps her lyrics light on their feet, moving with ease around the complexities of her compositions, her vocals rolling hard with the strength of conviction. Throughout Tender Forever’s work there is a commitment to understanding feelings and desires and seeing them through to completion. No Snare pushes through the wake and lays the turmoil to rest. What comes next is still unknown. In this darkness of loss and change there is a beat, a drive. Feel the shake from those little computer speakers, hear it grow and pulse through the woods. Watch as the evening comes and look toward the morning. Tracklist 1. Got To Let Go 2. Like The Snare That’s Gone 3. Only The Sounds You Made 4. Nothing At All 5. Day Number 6. But The Shape Is Wide 7. Nowhere Good Enough 8. Unfortunate Friends 9. When I’m In The Dark And You Take the Light...full text |
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