Fiona Apple

"All along, I really wanted each song to be its own little world," says Fiona Apple. "Every song that I write, I feel like I'm in a different world. And with this album, because it's been such a long period of time, I didn't want everything to sound one particular way." It's been a long and tangled road for Apple's stunning, intricate new album, Extraordinary Machine. But over the course of six years, multiple producers, business struggles, and life changes, she has maintained a clear sense of her musical vision-and returned with a collection of songs that reconfirms her place as one of the finest singer-songwriters of her generation. From the fragile music-hall lilt of the title track to the rollicking "Better Version of Me," from the fever intensity of "Not About Love" to the dreamy melancholy of "Oh Sailor," Extraordinary Machine reveals an artist with a sprawling, hard-fought range of emotions about love and identity, and with the musical palette to express them all. These are complicated songs for complicated sentiments. Almost a decade has passed since Apple, now 28, astonished listeners with her 1996 debut, Tidal. It was almost impossible to believe that a voice and a style so fully-formed was coming from a performer who was so young. Spurred by the controversial video for "Criminal" and such hits as the evocative, flawless "Shadowboxer," Tidal sold over three million copies, landed her on the cover of numerous national magazines, and established Apple as a major new figure in pop music. (more on fiona-apple.com)