| Naked Movie Star | |
| Type: | studio |
| Artist: | Cindy Lee Berryhill |
| Cover: | Naked Movie Star.jpg |
| Released: | 1989 |
| Genre: | Anti-folk |
| Label: | Rhino |
| Producer: | Lenny Kaye |
| Prev Title: | Who’s Gonna Save the World |
| Prev Year: | 1987 |
| Next Title: | Garage Orchestra |
| Next Year: | 1994 |
Naked Movie Star is the second album by the American musician Cindy Lee Berryhill, released in 1989.[1] [2] Like her debut, it was released by Rhino Records.[3] Berryhill supported the album with a North American tour that included shows with Sarah McLachlan, and later, Kevn Kinney and Peter Buck.[4] [5]
Recorded in New York City, the album was produced by Lenny Kaye, who also played guitar on the album, credited as "Jones Beach".[6] [7] [8] Kaye helped Berryhill move beyond the acoustic trio sound of her first album by using jazz musicians; Berryhill was interested in working with him more for his work with Patti Smith rather than his subsequent production credits.[8] Berryhill played guitar and harmonica on Naked Movie Star.[9]
"Yipee" is a 13-minute beat poetry-inspired track. "Trump" is about Donald Trump's 1980s real estate tactics.[10] "12 Dollar Motel" describes the existence of a prostitute.[10] The narrator of "Baby (Should I Have the Baby?)" contemplates an abortion. "Old Trombone Routine" is about a faded musical act.[11]
The Washington Post wrote that Berryhill is "the most audible alumna of New York's anti-folk movement, but there's also plenty of post-punk edge and neo-Beat humor on her new Rhino album."[12] Trouser Press noted that "the first album's spirited quirkiness eventually re-emerges, complete with a new set of purposeful musical reference points."[13] The Chicago Tribune determined that "the musical diversity adds another dimension to Berryhill's terrific stories, which she tells in an arrestingly matter-of-fact voice." The San Diego Union-Tribune concluded that, compared to the debut, Naked Movie Star "had a colder, more formal tone, the sound of a California kid who had strayed a long way from home."[14] LA Weekly called it "an impressive album by a distinctive artist."[15]
AllMusic wrote: "Just barely flirting with self-pity but never quite stepping over that line, thanks largely to a deflatingly self-mocking bridge that smartly punctures the overriding sense of 'woe is me,' 'What's Wrong with Me' also features the loveliest melody of Berryhill's career and a simple piano-based arrangement that makes it sound not unlike a Beach Boys ballad from the early '70s."