Fiona Apple’s debut album sounds like something you’d hear from a far more established artists. Her hooks are buried deeply behind the freeform melodies and musing poetry of her lyrics, and for an artist with so much commercial success - and such a pop legacy - this album is surprisingly un-poppy sounding today. She’s got some blues and some angst mixed in, but overall the mood to me sounds simply introspective. Not that that’s a simple task, of course, but the focus of the album is more on Fiona’s mind than anything else.

I love Fiona Apple’s later albums, probably because the hooks start to come to the forefront later in her career, but this is the kind of album nobody can look at and say “this artist is a rookie.” It’s like when a rookie athlete has a phenomenal year their first year in the professional league - you have to appreciate them both for their potential and for the potential they’ve already realized.

From the roundup Jamwise #49 - Best of 1996.