After the departure of Ellis and Vaughan in August 1993, Harvey embarked on a solo career exploring collaborations with other musicians.
To Bring You My Love (
1995) was produced by
Flood and John Parish, and quickly became a staple of
alternative rock. To Bring You My Love was a worldwide success, selling over one million copies, according to BPI. A more bluesy record than its predecessors, it saw Harvey broadening her sonic palette to include strings, organ and
synthesizers. It also generated a surprise
modern rock radio hit with the single "Down by the Water". The album received a glowing critical response and ended up being voted Album of the Year by
The Village Voice,
Rolling Stone,
USA Today,
People,
The New York Times and the
Los Angeles Times. Harvey was also voted Artist of the Year by
Rolling Stone and
Spin. Her album was ranked third in
Spin's Top 90 Albums of the '90s, behind
Nirvana and
Public Enemy.
Around this time, Harvey began experimenting with her image and adopting an elaborate, theatrical, almost
cabaret edge to her live shows. Where she once performed onstage in simple black leggings, turtleneck sweaters and
Doc Martens, she now began performing in ballgowns, pink catsuits, wigs and garish, vampish make-up (including false eyelashes and fingernails), and using stage props like a broomstick and a
Ziggy Stardust-style flashlight microphone. She denied the influence of
drag, Kabuki or
performance art on her new image, a look she affectionately dubbed "
Joan Crawford on
acid" in a 1996
Spin interview, but admitted that "it's that combination of being quite elegant and funny and revolting, all at the same time, that appeals to me. I actually find wearing make-up like that, sort of smeared around, as extremely beautiful. Maybe that’s just my twisted sense of beauty." However, she later told
Dazed & Confused magazine, "That was kind of a mask. It was much more of a mask than I’ve ever had. I was very lost as a person, at that point. I had no sense of self left at all", and has never again repeated the overt theatricality of the
To Bring You My Love tour. She also sang the theme song from
Philip Ridley's adult
fairy tale, "The Passion Of Darkly Noon" (released in 1996).
In 1998 she released
Is This Desire?, which met a more muted but overall still positive critical reception. Despite the few naysayers, Harvey herself cited it as her personal favourite; it saw her temporarily leaving the guitars behind and focusing on building dark, studio-based mood pieces around electronics, keyboards, piano and bass.
She reunited with her old bandmate Rob Ellis and multi-instrumentalist
Mick Harvey (no relation) for her 2000 album
Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea. Written in Dorset, Paris and New York, the album was a critical and commercial success, selling over one million copies worldwide and taking the
Mercury Music Prize in the following year. It mixed uncharacteristically lush, melodic
pop rock sounds with the gritty, thrashing, guitar-driven punk energy of her earlier records.
Radiohead singer
Thom Yorke was featured on three of the album's songs; he took lead vocal duties on "
This Mess We're In", and provided backing vocals for two others.
In 2001 she topped a readers' poll conducted by
Q magazine of the 100 Greatest Women in Rock Music. Her seventh album,
Uh Huh Her, was released
May 31, 2004. For the first time since
4-Track Demos, Harvey produced it alone and played every instrument bar the drums. The album, which was a sparser, more intimate, lo-fi and low-key affair than its predecessor, met with a generally positive response from critics and fans. She told
Rolling Stone "when I'm working on a new record, the most important thing is to not repeat myself ... that's always my aim: to try and cover new ground and really to challenge myself. Because I'm in this for learning."
In a recent issue,
Hot Press magazine praised her for crafting "some of the most erotic, powerful and positive love songs ever written".
In 2004,
Diplo extensively sampled "Down by the Water" for his
remix of "
Still Tippin'", the breakout single of
Houston rapper
Mike Jones (also featuring
Slim Thug and
Paul Wall). Diplo used the sample again in 2006 in "Now I Hollar" by the
indie hip-hop group
Plastic Little, a track featuring
Spank Rock and included on the album
She's Mature.
In
May 2006, Harvey played her first UK gig of the year, revealing that her new album would be almost entirely piano-based. Later in 2006, she released her first concert
DVD, Please Leave Quietly, directed by Maria Mochnacz, which contained songs from her entire career as well as behind-the-scene video clips between performances. On
October 23, 2006 she released
The Peel Sessions 1991–2004.
In
November 2006 she started working on her eighth studio album,
White Chalk, with Flood, John Parish, and Eric Drew Feldman. It was released in Europe on September 24, 2007, and in the United States on October 2. The album marks a radical departure from her usual style, consisting mainly of piano ballads.
