--- title: Jenny Lewis 'The Voyager' Album Review description: Her first solo album in six years does not disappoint canonical: https://time.com/3051692/jenny-lewis-the-voyager-review/ author: Nolan Feeney article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-07-29T15:37:31.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-21T09:23:43.264Z article:section: Entertainment og:title: REVIEW: Jenny Lewis Is Out of This World on The Voyager og:description: Her first solo album in six years does not disappoint og:url: https://time.com/3051692/jenny-lewis-the-voyager-review/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda8953797b78b278/69869d971eebf7399d3720c7/jenny-lewis-the-voyager.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: jenny-lewis-the-voyager og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: REVIEW: Jenny Lewis Is Out of This World on The Voyager twitter:description: Her first solo album in six years does not disappoint twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda8953797b78b278/69869d971eebf7399d3720c7/jenny-lewis-the-voyager.jpg?branch=production&width=3840&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # REVIEW: Jenny Lewis Is Out of This World on _The Voyager_  by [Nolan Feeney](https://time.com/author/nolan-feeney/)  ## Nolan Feeney Jul 29, 2014 3:37 PM UTC  The Voyager The VoyagerWarner Bros.  by [Nolan Feeney](https://time.com/author/nolan-feeney/)  ## Nolan Feeney Jul 29, 2014 3:37 PM UTC Jenny Lewis is the kind of artist who could drop an album of animal noises she recorded in the woods and still have fans foaming at the mouth. So beloved is [the former Rilo Kiley frontwoman](http://time.com/3000979/jenny-lewis-bon-voyager/) that it’s almost surprising there wasn’t more outcry from her devotees in the six years it took to release another solo album. Sure, she kept somewhat busy — putting out a record with boyfriend Johnathan Rice, touring with a reunited The Postal Service — but as she reminds listeners on her third outing, _The Voyager_ (out now), there’s nothing quite like Jenny Lewis front and center. _The Voyager_ is her least rootsy album to date, one that recalls the polish of her old band’s swan song, 2007’s _Under the Blacklight_, rather than the folk and country leanings of 2006’s _Rabbit Fur Coat_ and 2008’s _Acid Tongue._ As effortless and breezy as the final product sounds, though, _The Voyager_ wasn’t so easy to make: in the years since her last album, Rilo Kiley disbanded, Lewis’ father passed away and she battled severe insomnia the once kept her up for five days straight. Lewis can be cagey about just how much she’s revealing in the lyrics that appear most confessional — see a recent, almost comically tight-lipped explanation of the [lyrics in “Just One of the Guys”](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/27/magazine/the-jenny-lewis-experience.html?%5Fr=0) — but references to her struggles do dot the record. Or rather, sandwiching tales of colorful characters and vice, they bookend it. On the album opener “Head Underwater,” Lewis sings of mourning, hallucinations and finding freedom after confronting her own mortality; on the closing title track, she mentions wake-up calls and departing for heaven to get out of this world. Befitting its title, the album meditates on a number of journeys: entering the altered states of sleep deprivation, overcoming personal turmoil, crossing into life after death. Her subject matter couldn’t be more suited to her creative process. “I am writing from a very simplistic place musically, and I feel like the words and melody come from somewhere else,” [she told TIME earlier this summer](http://time.com/3000979/jenny-lewis-bon-voyager/). “They don’t come from an intellectual place, they arrive from another zone entirely.” Lewis’ lyrics earn praise for their inclusive, non-judgmental studies of heartbreak and character flaws, but — her modesty aside — it’s hard to find a better summary of her songwriting strengths than her own explanation of how she works. Lewis’ music is timeless and her voice is far from otherwordly, but there is something to be said for the way her melodies have a habit of suddenly veering off into emotional sweet spots, taking songs into another zone entirely (to borrow her words). You hear it on the chorus of the _Acid Tongue_ title track when [Lewis sings the word “alive,”](http://youtu.be/XajpuQliptc?t=39s) and, thankfully, you hear it over and over again across _The Voyager_. Like any good film score, string arrangements and production flourishes from Beck and Ryan Adams nudge listeners’ feelings toward those places, but it’s almost unnecessary at this point — Lewis can [get you there](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0e9eameKV4) all on her own. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/3051692/jenny-lewis-the-voyager-review/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/3051692/jenny-lewis-the-voyager-review/"},"headline":"REVIEW: Jenny Lewis Is Out of This World on The Voyager","datePublished":"2014-07-29T15:37:31.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-21T09:23:43.264Z","description":"Her first solo album in six years does not disappoint","url":"https://time.com/3051692/jenny-lewis-the-voyager-review/","keywords":["Music","Music Review"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda8953797b78b278/69869d971eebf7399d3720c7/jenny-lewis-the-voyager.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Nolan Feeney","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/nolan-feeney/"}],"articleSection":"Entertainment","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltda8953797b78b278/69869d971eebf7399d3720c7/jenny-lewis-the-voyager.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"jenny-lewis-the-voyager","caption":"Jenny Lewis, The Voyager","creditText":"Warner Bros.","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/entertainment/","name":"Entertainment"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/3051692/jenny-lewis-the-voyager-review/","name":"REVIEW: Jenny Lewis Is Out of This World on The Voyager"}}]}] ```