4/18/2004
Film Review: Kill Bill, Vol. 2
Woe is Bill
[Note: My roommate, who has an intensely personal relationship with "Kill Bill," has written a far more intensive (and spoiler-laden...be warned!) critique of the film. If it doesn't convert a few Vol. 2 Believers, I don't know what will. If you liked the film, please read it and then call him personally for extensive de-programming. Ian's Boss Critique]
The first thing to understand about “Kill Bill, Vol. 2” is that, despite any initial intentions on the part of Quentin Tarantino, it is a sequel of the first film. It is impossible to view the two as one unified film because, as DVD sales for Volume One will certainly prove, the films are being (successfully) marketed as a distinct pair, not parts of a whole. This is a crucial distinction, because it allows the first film to exist in its own universe, and also makes the fundamental flaws of Volume 2 more readily apparent. Volume 2 undercuts many significant ideas presented in the first film, drastically alters the personalities of pre-established characters, and ultimately disappoints on the same epic scale it has consciously set up.
The opening (after an awkward and unnecessary “catch up” prologue—the speech that Uma Thurman gives in the theatrical previews) almost immediately hints at the wrongheaded route the rest of the film will follow. The Bride (Uma Thurman) travels to the deserts of El Paso to knock off Budd (Michael Madsen), the next name on her Death List Five. Upon being discovered by Budd, she is shot in the chest with rock salt and buried alive. She cries and screams and pounds helplessly as Budd and an unfunny redneck sidekick shovel dirt over the coffin they have sealed her in.
Where is the confident, stone-faced, deadly Bride of Volume One? Where is that woman who, being a fully empowered and totally kick-ass female assassin, knows she will not only survive the whole movie, but will kill any stupid motherfucker who is unfortunate enough to get in her way? She certainly isn’t present in this instance, as well as four similar scenes of graceless humanity. Tarantino has personally called the setting of “Kill Bill” a “movie universe,” but he doesn’t seem to take the phrase to heart. Every glimpse of the Bride’s weakness through an emotional breakdown tears the fragile fabric of cinematic homage the movie has defined for itself. Rather than making the Bride appear to be a three-dimensional character, the constant hints of intense feminine vulnerability only undermine the Bride’s movie-universe invincibility explored so successfully in the first film, making her character confusing and her quest unfocused.
Tarantino, in a way, has missed his own point. He has assembled “Kill Bill” as an amalgam of every action film he has seen, which is all of them. Kung-fu, spaghetti western, grindhouse, schlock-horror, blaxploitation and countless other influences inform the limitations of “reality” established in the two films. By taking the emphasis off of action and asking the audience to really empathize with any of the characters in the film, Tarantino has shot himself in the foot stylistically. His characters are mythological cartoons, the kinds of characters who can be instantly identified through name alone—it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that “Budd” is a spineless scumbag, or that “Elle Driver” is a femme fatale. Distinctly human touches, such as themes of maternity and unrequited love, fly directly in the face of the terms set up in the film’s designated universe. The result is a jumbled, manipulative, and occasionally embarrassing mess.
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of the second film—aside from containing the most anticlimactic finale in any Tarantino film to date—is its decidedly lackluster soundtrack. The soundtrack to Volume One is an entity unto itself, a satisfying concept album that encompasses generations of film music and exudes cool. The music in the second film not only isn’t up to par with Volume One, but is essentially non-existent. I can remember about three songs from the film, the most memorable being an intriguing but inappropriately placed hip-hop mash-up of the Zombies’ 60’s pop classic “She’s Not There.” Even an audio clip from “Shogun Assassin,” one of the many films Tarantino has absorbed in his years of rabid film geekdom, is ripped from the first track of a GZA solo project (also produced by the RZA, who composed the film’s score) and not necessarily hand-selected by the director himself. The soundtrack is sloppy, awkward and, worst of all, incredibly boring.
The film has a few spectacular moments of inspired action filmmaking, including a riveting training sequence with the enigmatic kung-fu master Pai Mei (Gordon Liu) that effectively replicates the crash-zooming grit of a Shaw Brothers film. Also mind-blowing is a close-quarters catfight between Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah) and the Bride. But the moments are fleeting and, for the most part, arbitrary. Scenes feel randomly inserted rather than elegantly constructed, and fight scenes of any kind are few and far between. David Carradine and Uma Thurman do the most any actor or actress could be expected to with the material, but the real problem is that this time around the material isn’t particularly interesting. Bill and the Bride sit and chat about the Nietzschean implications of Superman comics and what it means to be a good parent, but guess what they don’t do? I’ll give you a hint: it involves ass-kicking.
“Kill Bill, Vol. 2” seems to be a calculated effort to stray from the formula that made the first film so successful. But rather than making the two films seem complex and cohesive in hindsight, the technique instead hopelessly scatters the series, making it impossible to view the two films as a rewarding whole. The second film emerges as a needlessly confusing, frequently boring and ultimately unsatisfying conclusion to what could have been one of Tarantino’s greatest achievements in film.
0 comments
4/15/2004
Mission of Burma- ONoffON (Matador, 2004)
They’re back, baby.
Mission of Burma, inarguably one of the single most influential bands in the earliest history of indie rock, have released their sophomore album after a hiatus of twenty-two years. An entire culture, subculture, and sub-subculture have developed around the sound that they largely helped pioneer, complete with a time-tested touring and distribution infrastructure and an entire school of criticism specifically developed to judge the music. Members of the latter will be both overjoyed and endlessly frustrated, no doubt, with the task of figuring out exactly how they should handle the comeback album and cultural event that is ONoffON.
How does one even begin to approach this music? The effects of Mission of Burma’s limited but commanding output on the indie music scene are incalculable—we’re talking about a band that R.E.M. has cited as one of their primary developmental influences. Mission of Burma was absent from the music scene during the rise of R.E.M. and plenty other early alternative-rock pioneers, during the college rock of the Pixies, during the generation-defining (whether we like it or not) explosion of Nirvana, during the post-rock movement. Rock has literally died and been "revived" since these guys last graced the recording studio. ...So what the hell is this?
Well, it’s a lot of things. The band sums it up fairly succinctly in the title. In a way, it's as though someone turned off the MoB switch accidentally and then forgot about it for a couple decades. Flip the switch ON again and there’s Roger Miller, dutifully clawing away at a messily anthemic riff; there’s Clint Conley, chugging along with a simple bass line to pump your post-pubescent fist by; there’s Peter Prescott thrashing about like a hardcore drummer on horse tranquilizers; there's tape-manipulating wizard Martin Swope—actually, the elusive Swope has been replaced by Bob Weston, but the looping enhancement aiding the band's sonic assault is still readily apparent, albeit not quite as well concealed as Swope’s masterful cut ‘n’ paste jobs. And listen...there’s still tape hiss on these tracks, for God’s sake!
The album clocks in at just under an hour, with a whopping sixteen tracks packed tightly with uneasy anthems, ballads on the brink of mid-tempo meltdown and all other sorts of potential indie rock classic material. Opener “The Setup” allows for a quick bit of catching up, with an instantly memorable guitar riff leading to passionate, repetitive lyrics balanced precariously between personal and political: “The heart sets itself up/ Where’s the question/ I cannot react to.../Now I live inside the circle”—vague, compelling mini-manifestos, delivered as always with fiery intensity. A few brain-melting tape loops help the song crumble in style, only to reform for a final chorus. Pointing out that the track is by-the-book MoB would be missing the point—besides which, it would be a bit like complaining that the New Testament is too derivative of the old one.
The ballads (the bittersweet “Falling” stands as an album highlight) are particularly sincere, and the band’s dead-on evocation of youthful angst is somewhat surprising considering that the members of the band are well into their forties at this point. Both “The Enthusiast” and “Nicotine Bomb” are surefire sing-along staples, with some of the catchiest, if perhaps most obvious, choruses the band has devised to date, while “Wounded World” and “Fever Moon” are about as raw and enigmatic as anything the band has recorded. “Hunt Again” presages Hüsker Dü’s transformation into hard-edged alternative rock—whoa, wait a minute...even Hüsker Dü’s post-group solo projects have long since dissolved! The comparison is completely invalid! It’s 2004, people!
Again, frustration. What the hell is this? Some kind of glorious time capsule from a parallel universe containing the follow-up that Mission of Burma might have produced twenty years ago had a shoddy indie infrastructure, Roger Miller’s severe tinnitus, and Cruel, Cruel Fate not interfered? Honestly, the band’s sound hasn’t perceptibly evolved very much at all, despite the fact that “evolution” doesn’t even begin to describe what has happened to the very music scene they helped to shape in its infancy. The tape loops are a bit more obtrusive, and some string and backup vocal accompaniment flesh out a sound that, a decade after its original conception, might be considered “lo-fi.” The band sounds crisper, if not entirely polished. Roger Miller probably wears cooler earplugs. But these changes have to do with personnel change, a newfound penchant for subtle instrumental decoration, and advances in earplug technology, respectively. None of it has anything to do with any change in rock music in the past two decades. It’s a goddamn time warp.
But who cares? If the Minutemen could somehow magically reappear this very moment in their original incarnation, would we want them to buy a drum machine and rechristen themselves dancepunkers? They already specialized in minimalist “funk-punk”, in the true sense of both words, and they did it better and with more sincerity than anyone before or since. Likewise, Mission of Burma have earned the right to a certain amount of diplomatic immunity as far as “new sound” is concerned by pretty well nailing it the first time around. The fact that ONoffON honestly sounds as fresh today as anything else currently making its way up preemptive year-end top ten lists is a stunning reminder of just how ahead of their time the band was in the first place.
The genius of ONoffON is in its paradox: the music drips with “retro” charm—a proverbial wet dream for the downtrodden white collars who grew up with the “Academy Fight Song” 7” single tucked under their pillows—but never consciously calls attention to its inherent nostalgia. The album is a vital piece of contemporary music, even though it could have (and, in a far more boss universe, should have) been released just about twenty years ago to the day. The feat is nothing short of awe-inspiring: Mission of Burma are officially ON again. Frank Black, I hope you’re taking notes.
0 comments
They’re back, baby.
Mission of Burma, inarguably one of the single most influential bands in the earliest history of indie rock, have released their sophomore album after a hiatus of twenty-two years. An entire culture, subculture, and sub-subculture have developed around the sound that they largely helped pioneer, complete with a time-tested touring and distribution infrastructure and an entire school of criticism specifically developed to judge the music. Members of the latter will be both overjoyed and endlessly frustrated, no doubt, with the task of figuring out exactly how they should handle the comeback album and cultural event that is ONoffON.
How does one even begin to approach this music? The effects of Mission of Burma’s limited but commanding output on the indie music scene are incalculable—we’re talking about a band that R.E.M. has cited as one of their primary developmental influences. Mission of Burma was absent from the music scene during the rise of R.E.M. and plenty other early alternative-rock pioneers, during the college rock of the Pixies, during the generation-defining (whether we like it or not) explosion of Nirvana, during the post-rock movement. Rock has literally died and been "revived" since these guys last graced the recording studio. ...So what the hell is this?
Well, it’s a lot of things. The band sums it up fairly succinctly in the title. In a way, it's as though someone turned off the MoB switch accidentally and then forgot about it for a couple decades. Flip the switch ON again and there’s Roger Miller, dutifully clawing away at a messily anthemic riff; there’s Clint Conley, chugging along with a simple bass line to pump your post-pubescent fist by; there’s Peter Prescott thrashing about like a hardcore drummer on horse tranquilizers; there's tape-manipulating wizard Martin Swope—actually, the elusive Swope has been replaced by Bob Weston, but the looping enhancement aiding the band's sonic assault is still readily apparent, albeit not quite as well concealed as Swope’s masterful cut ‘n’ paste jobs. And listen...there’s still tape hiss on these tracks, for God’s sake!
The album clocks in at just under an hour, with a whopping sixteen tracks packed tightly with uneasy anthems, ballads on the brink of mid-tempo meltdown and all other sorts of potential indie rock classic material. Opener “The Setup” allows for a quick bit of catching up, with an instantly memorable guitar riff leading to passionate, repetitive lyrics balanced precariously between personal and political: “The heart sets itself up/ Where’s the question/ I cannot react to.../Now I live inside the circle”—vague, compelling mini-manifestos, delivered as always with fiery intensity. A few brain-melting tape loops help the song crumble in style, only to reform for a final chorus. Pointing out that the track is by-the-book MoB would be missing the point—besides which, it would be a bit like complaining that the New Testament is too derivative of the old one.
The ballads (the bittersweet “Falling” stands as an album highlight) are particularly sincere, and the band’s dead-on evocation of youthful angst is somewhat surprising considering that the members of the band are well into their forties at this point. Both “The Enthusiast” and “Nicotine Bomb” are surefire sing-along staples, with some of the catchiest, if perhaps most obvious, choruses the band has devised to date, while “Wounded World” and “Fever Moon” are about as raw and enigmatic as anything the band has recorded. “Hunt Again” presages Hüsker Dü’s transformation into hard-edged alternative rock—whoa, wait a minute...even Hüsker Dü’s post-group solo projects have long since dissolved! The comparison is completely invalid! It’s 2004, people!
Again, frustration. What the hell is this? Some kind of glorious time capsule from a parallel universe containing the follow-up that Mission of Burma might have produced twenty years ago had a shoddy indie infrastructure, Roger Miller’s severe tinnitus, and Cruel, Cruel Fate not interfered? Honestly, the band’s sound hasn’t perceptibly evolved very much at all, despite the fact that “evolution” doesn’t even begin to describe what has happened to the very music scene they helped to shape in its infancy. The tape loops are a bit more obtrusive, and some string and backup vocal accompaniment flesh out a sound that, a decade after its original conception, might be considered “lo-fi.” The band sounds crisper, if not entirely polished. Roger Miller probably wears cooler earplugs. But these changes have to do with personnel change, a newfound penchant for subtle instrumental decoration, and advances in earplug technology, respectively. None of it has anything to do with any change in rock music in the past two decades. It’s a goddamn time warp.
But who cares? If the Minutemen could somehow magically reappear this very moment in their original incarnation, would we want them to buy a drum machine and rechristen themselves dancepunkers? They already specialized in minimalist “funk-punk”, in the true sense of both words, and they did it better and with more sincerity than anyone before or since. Likewise, Mission of Burma have earned the right to a certain amount of diplomatic immunity as far as “new sound” is concerned by pretty well nailing it the first time around. The fact that ONoffON honestly sounds as fresh today as anything else currently making its way up preemptive year-end top ten lists is a stunning reminder of just how ahead of their time the band was in the first place.
The genius of ONoffON is in its paradox: the music drips with “retro” charm—a proverbial wet dream for the downtrodden white collars who grew up with the “Academy Fight Song” 7” single tucked under their pillows—but never consciously calls attention to its inherent nostalgia. The album is a vital piece of contemporary music, even though it could have (and, in a far more boss universe, should have) been released just about twenty years ago to the day. The feat is nothing short of awe-inspiring: Mission of Burma are officially ON again. Frank Black, I hope you’re taking notes.
0 comments
4/12/2004
!!!- Louden Up Now (Warp, 2004)
DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE
OK, maybe I was wrong. I’ve been knocking the whole “dancepunk” trend for a few months now, mostly due to a less than fantastic experience with The Rapture—which, unfortunately, I’m sure has more than a little to do with Pitchfork’s album-of-the-year foolishness. And what meaning is there in such a claim, really? But O My Brothers (and Sisters), I have finally seen the light. !!!, pronounced “chk chk chk,” or “shuh shuh shuh,” or “[tongue thing] [tongue thing] [tongue thing],” have released their sophomore album, Louden Up Now, to hyped expectations a few notches above staggering. To say they’ve lived up to the hype is almost irrelevant. What the group has done is provided an album’s worth of unshakable foundation to a trend, almost single-handedly elevating a type of music that until now smacked of an extended fad to full-fledged genre status. I will officially stop referring to dancepunk in quotation marks. There, I’ve done it already.
!!! don’t waste any time getting started. Incredible opener “When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Gets Krazee” seems to begin right in the middle of a heated street-funk jam, vaguely resembling an updated version of the opening track from On the Corner. !!! channel equal parts Remain in Light -era Talking Heads, Happy Mondays, and Andre 3000’s sound effects library to churn out a punishing six-minute groove. The lyrics are an amalgam of punk ambivalence (“stare at the sky”) and testosterone-injected dancehall bravado (“you can learn a lot from taking your chances/you can learn a lot from taking your pants off”).
Nic Offer’s vocals absolutely pulsate with raw exuberant energy. When he tells the President of the United States of America to suck his fucking dick (on the darkly intense “Dear Can”), you better believe Dubya is going to do it—fast, hard and to the beat. Offer's range is also quite versatile, as his Prince impression proves on the politically-titled but groove-fueled “Pardon My Freedom.” !!!’s political slant (what’s left of funky?) becomes more evident on subsequent tracks. On the near-epic “Hello? Is This Thing On?” Offer, half-kidding at most, suggests that no one is listening to the problems of the younger generation, and that the solution, of course, is to dance.
The two-part “Shitscheisemerde” redefines the boundaries of how much fun can be had with the word “shit” (and, for European audiences, “scheise” and “merde”), along with serving as an excellent bit of rock star chest-beating/wishful thinking (“catch me singing in twenty years in some local county fair”). The song even allows a quick twofer political dis, criticizing both Bush and Tony Blair for acting in self-interest rather than in the interest of their respective constituencies. “Me and Giuliani Down by the Schoolyard” is just as kick-ass here as it was in single format—that the track fits so naturally into its surroundings is a testament to the album’s uniform strength.
And for anyone who still thinks !!! needs to diversify, the band bewilders and amazes with “Space Island,” a brief but stunning deconstruction of the band’s already challenging punk-funk. What sounds a bit like late night Latin radio programming emitting from a creepy cabbie's speakers trips and stumbles for a few minutes before wheezing to a close. Meanwhile Offer coos with as much treacle as he can muster, which isn’t much, “you’ve got the morning/you’ve got the stars/ what else is there to have?” Then, in true faux gushy loverman fashion, he puts a metaphorical shushing finger to our lips, whispering, “Wait...don’t answer that.” Of course, there is more to have—a final instrumental remix of “Shitscheisemerde” constructed from a jarring breakbeat and gloomy post-punk guitar stabs. The track, like every track on the album, practically begs everyone listening to dance. So do it! Do it now! DANCE DANCE DANCE!
Dance as though the world depends on it! Because, according to !!!, it does. It really, really does.
0 comments
DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE DANCE
OK, maybe I was wrong. I’ve been knocking the whole “dancepunk” trend for a few months now, mostly due to a less than fantastic experience with The Rapture—which, unfortunately, I’m sure has more than a little to do with Pitchfork’s album-of-the-year foolishness. And what meaning is there in such a claim, really? But O My Brothers (and Sisters), I have finally seen the light. !!!, pronounced “chk chk chk,” or “shuh shuh shuh,” or “[tongue thing] [tongue thing] [tongue thing],” have released their sophomore album, Louden Up Now, to hyped expectations a few notches above staggering. To say they’ve lived up to the hype is almost irrelevant. What the group has done is provided an album’s worth of unshakable foundation to a trend, almost single-handedly elevating a type of music that until now smacked of an extended fad to full-fledged genre status. I will officially stop referring to dancepunk in quotation marks. There, I’ve done it already.
!!! don’t waste any time getting started. Incredible opener “When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Gets Krazee” seems to begin right in the middle of a heated street-funk jam, vaguely resembling an updated version of the opening track from On the Corner. !!! channel equal parts Remain in Light -era Talking Heads, Happy Mondays, and Andre 3000’s sound effects library to churn out a punishing six-minute groove. The lyrics are an amalgam of punk ambivalence (“stare at the sky”) and testosterone-injected dancehall bravado (“you can learn a lot from taking your chances/you can learn a lot from taking your pants off”).
Nic Offer’s vocals absolutely pulsate with raw exuberant energy. When he tells the President of the United States of America to suck his fucking dick (on the darkly intense “Dear Can”), you better believe Dubya is going to do it—fast, hard and to the beat. Offer's range is also quite versatile, as his Prince impression proves on the politically-titled but groove-fueled “Pardon My Freedom.” !!!’s political slant (what’s left of funky?) becomes more evident on subsequent tracks. On the near-epic “Hello? Is This Thing On?” Offer, half-kidding at most, suggests that no one is listening to the problems of the younger generation, and that the solution, of course, is to dance.
The two-part “Shitscheisemerde” redefines the boundaries of how much fun can be had with the word “shit” (and, for European audiences, “scheise” and “merde”), along with serving as an excellent bit of rock star chest-beating/wishful thinking (“catch me singing in twenty years in some local county fair”). The song even allows a quick twofer political dis, criticizing both Bush and Tony Blair for acting in self-interest rather than in the interest of their respective constituencies. “Me and Giuliani Down by the Schoolyard” is just as kick-ass here as it was in single format—that the track fits so naturally into its surroundings is a testament to the album’s uniform strength.
And for anyone who still thinks !!! needs to diversify, the band bewilders and amazes with “Space Island,” a brief but stunning deconstruction of the band’s already challenging punk-funk. What sounds a bit like late night Latin radio programming emitting from a creepy cabbie's speakers trips and stumbles for a few minutes before wheezing to a close. Meanwhile Offer coos with as much treacle as he can muster, which isn’t much, “you’ve got the morning/you’ve got the stars/ what else is there to have?” Then, in true faux gushy loverman fashion, he puts a metaphorical shushing finger to our lips, whispering, “Wait...don’t answer that.” Of course, there is more to have—a final instrumental remix of “Shitscheisemerde” constructed from a jarring breakbeat and gloomy post-punk guitar stabs. The track, like every track on the album, practically begs everyone listening to dance. So do it! Do it now! DANCE DANCE DANCE!
Dance as though the world depends on it! Because, according to !!!, it does. It really, really does.
0 comments
4/10/2004
I LOVE THE 90S!
Talk Talk: Eden or Bust
Albums on the Top 100: Laughing Stock (1991)
The term “post-rock,” despite its recent ubiquity in the music press, is a fairly shortsighted and presumptuous description. Still, only one year into the 90s (and a good five or so years before the phrase was coined), Talk Talk, a group of new wave synth-poppers turned organic “free” rock collage masterminds, both defined and set the standard in the genre. The myriad of bands, collectives, and brooding, quasi-political, clove-smoking art school punks attempting to move “beyond” rock in the late 90s and early 00s never surpassed the stunning achievement of Laughing Stock. On their final album, Talk Talk created music that is, literally, beyond rock—mutated, highly evolved, but still recognizable. The album is an incomparable experience, and is truly a great achievement in modern music.
Talk Talk began its existence as a straightforward synth-pop unit, headed by Mark Hollis as a more accessible outgrowth of his short-lived post-punk group the Reaction. Talk Talk’s breakthrough sophomore album, In My Life, moved slightly beyond the fairly pedestrian sound of their early XTC/ Duran Duran origins apparent on their debut, but the more complex pop still relied largely on new wave gimmickry and a strategy of compiling singles rather than developing a cohesive album statement. 1986’s The Colour of Spring further developed the intricacies of the band’s instrumentation, the complexity of their musical and lyrical schemes, and the general cohesiveness of their overall sound, to some extent presaging the pastoral pop masterpiece of XTC’s landmark Skylarking by mere months.
A new sound was bubbling just beneath the surface of The Colour of Spring; the potential for a wholly new and dynamic form of music was palpable, due in part to Hollis’ growing isolation from the rest of the band and heavy reliance on dozens of studio musicians to provide a wider sonic palette for rock experimentation. In 1988, after holing himself, the band and an army of studio musicians in the band’s London studio, Hollis and Talk Talk emerged with Spirit of Eden, a self-proclaimed “untourable” album that decisively broke through any artificial constraints of the band’s previous sound. The pop melodrama of Spring was replaced by an earnest aim at a more natural form of musical transcendence.
Notable in the band’s progression on their watershed album was an active rejection of the electronic pretense that characterized the band’s early sound. Some electric organ and guitar, as well as other post-production aural tricks, remain dominant, but for the most part the electronically pre-programmed rigidity that bogged down the band’s early material gave way to loose jam sessions with multiple percussionists and heavily acoustic instrumentation, all of which were fairly far removed from the vocabulary of new wave. Some semblance of a traditional verse-chorus rock song structure remained, but the limitations of structure were stretched to a jazz-like fluidity, with “verses” becoming tense, hypnotic grooves and “choruses” becoming strikingly brief, often cathartic realizations of the building subliminal energy.
Hollis, who at the onset of Talk Talk’s career owed more than a little to Andy Partridge, imploded on Eden, suggesting perhaps the natural conclusion of Partridge’s infamous stage fright. Hollis opted for a hushed, foreboding delivery of vaguely religious lyrics. Like many great poets confronting personal issues of religious origin, Hollis utilizes intentional obliqueness to elucidate a distinct spirituality without perpetuating religious assumptions or presenting definitive conclusions. References to repentance, omnipotent “rage”, and, of course, “spirit”—a word that serves as the complete chorus of “I Believe in You,” (which, somewhat remarkably, is not necessarily about God)—are balanced with succinct secular tirades against material wealth (“Wealth”), judicial corruption (“The Rainbow Song”), and narcissistic self-pity (“Desire”).
The musical complexity and unabashed spiritual slant of Spirit of Eden, along with making touring nearly impossible, effectively limited the band’s audience, which was already maintaining relatively “cult” status. The music might have appealed to adventurous audiences, but the baggage of the band’s synth-pop origins undoubtedly raised skepticism regarding the band’s new direction. Likewise, diehard fans had already accepted a considerable shift in tone with the release of The Colour of Spring, and Eden was an even further cry from any previous Talk Talk album. The band had perhaps evolved too rapidly, not allowing for the gradual growth of a new audience while simultaneously alienating their existing audience.
None of this stopped the band from further redefining the boundaries of their music. Three years after the release of Spirit of Eden, Talk Talk emerged with what would be their enigmatic final release, Laughing Stock. If Eden was Hollis’s tangible expression of intangible religious passion and spirituality, then Laughing Stock is its epistemological opposite. The music and words, most of which are indecipherable without a lyric sheet, are complex, at times frustratingly elliptical, and ultimately inscrutable. But the passion behind the expression is clearer than on any of the group's previous releases. By further obscuring the already vague spiritual imagery and further loosening the already elastic musical arrangements, the “band”—which at this point was essentially Hollis plus studio musicians—finally achieved a natural, progressive sound that cannot be adequately characterized by anything created before or since.
The album’s stand-alone uniqueness is on par with Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, which itself illuminates spiritual truths behind posed unanswerable questions through perfectly realized artistic unity and connectivity, both in terms of the ensemble’s relationship to one another and Morrison’s relationship to his own material. In short, Laughing Stock expresses the inexpressible, making genre definition moot (a laughing stock?) and truly putting the music in a class of its own, removed from its influences and instead linked primarily to emotion and experience.
“Myrrhman” opens the album with a trembling, uneasy guitar chord, a wavering trumpet note, and some restrained piano. Hollis finally chimes in with some of his most ambiguous lyrics to date: “Place my chair/ At the backroom door/ Help me up/ I can’t wait anymore.” Later mention of a “blessed love” is far more vague than the Christian conception of God apparent on Spirit of Eden, and such ambiguity helps to emphasize atmosphere over a direct message. The song staggers through five minutes of fragile atmospherics until it finally dissolves into an extended bittersweet string ensemble coda.
“Ascension Day” infuses an open-ended slow jam with discordant electric guitar, building to an unexpected anticlimax consisting of a sweet Hollis vocal melody and some thick, gospel-style organ chords. A steady, pulsating beat hints at straight rock music but slides in and out of multiple complex time signatures in a fashion more suggestive of post-bop jazz. Finally, an intense build-up of distorted guitar cuts off abruptly, leading to a reverberating piano tone.
The hypnotic organ pattern of “After the Flood” flows naturally out of the preceding track’s chaos. The song almost instantly clicks into an assured groove that continues uninterrupted for close to ten minutes. This track alone informs countless indie acts to follow, wedding a rhythmic rock backbone to organic drone in a style that Yo La Tengo would help popularize in the mid-nineties.
“Taphead” brings the album back to the opening track’s fragile construction, ratcheting up intensity with a few eerily sparse horn lines distantly approximating the opening track of Miles Davis’s Sketches of Spain. There is a distinct helplessness and hopelessness expressed in the track that undercuts any overt profession of the possibility of spiritual transcendence. Hollis’ lyrics border on cynical, a trait absent from most of his work. He interposes Big Questions (“what worth is upon me”) with concrete images of futility in life (“toughing”/”tear”/“consume”) and finality in death (“dust to dust”). Ultimately, he suggests, questions of spirituality are eternally unknowable, while the limitations of living are constantly, brutally fathomable.
“New Grass” concedes the existence of some kind of spiritual salvation that is actively called into question in “Taproot,” and accentuates its decidedly more optimistic message with uplifting polyrhythmic percussion and gospel organ and piano. “New Grass” is the one song most closely linked in tone to Spirit of Eden, but the track is still markedly subdued, reluctant to embrace any specific religious connotation.
“Runeii” is a quiet, mournful closer, and one of the most stripped-down tracks on the album. Guitars are muddied and placed low in the mix, while vocals and slightly out-of-tune piano are brought to the forefront. The track offers little finality lyrically, directly confronting a “son” who may in fact be Jesus with unsettling calmness. Hollis remarks quietly, “Well aren’t you suspect/ In answer unread,” adding what seems to be an indictment of Christianity: “Apologies met/ An effigy blessed” and, closing the album, “Slow to bleed fair son.” A low guitar growl fades and a simple piano chord—something like the emotional inverse of the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life”—ends the album.
I’ve played Laughing Stock for a few of my friends in the hope that they, too, will come to form an intimate emotional bond with the music. My success rate so far has been nil, and I’ve found that pushing the album on someone guarantees that the person will fail to connect to the music on a deeply personal level. Friends have called the music boring, jam-band-y, and “indie shit.” My Jewish firecracker of a girlfriend went so far as to call it “Christian Rock.” I’m still reeling from that one.
I think that the reason that so many people have failed to connect with the album, and the reason why it’s just now getting some of the attention it has been due for more than a decade, is that a true appreciation of the music requires a kind of consideration unrelated to genre, roots, and general musical preconceptions. My pick of Astral Weeks as my personal favorite album of all time perplexed a few of my friends for the same reason, I think—like Astral Weeks, Laughing Stock cannot be considered in a traditional popular music context. It must serve as a personal, perhaps spiritual, deeply emotional experience, largely absent of historical importance and direct association to other music. I believe that both albums can offer this experience, but certainly not to someone going in with the wrong expectations (as was the case in forcing it upon some of my friends).
Laughing Stock is not for everyone, not as a matter of taste but as a matter of emotional potency of the individual experience. It is not rock, and is not really “post-rock,” though the advent of the genre has provided some clear-cut historical context in which to consider the album—hence the current slew of recent Talk Talk converts, myself included. The album stands alone in my mind as a personal favorite of the 90’s because it exists in a universe free of categorization, beyond “rock” or any other label one might apply. It is simply Laughing Stock.
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Talk Talk: Eden or Bust
Albums on the Top 100: Laughing Stock (1991)
The term “post-rock,” despite its recent ubiquity in the music press, is a fairly shortsighted and presumptuous description. Still, only one year into the 90s (and a good five or so years before the phrase was coined), Talk Talk, a group of new wave synth-poppers turned organic “free” rock collage masterminds, both defined and set the standard in the genre. The myriad of bands, collectives, and brooding, quasi-political, clove-smoking art school punks attempting to move “beyond” rock in the late 90s and early 00s never surpassed the stunning achievement of Laughing Stock. On their final album, Talk Talk created music that is, literally, beyond rock—mutated, highly evolved, but still recognizable. The album is an incomparable experience, and is truly a great achievement in modern music.
Talk Talk began its existence as a straightforward synth-pop unit, headed by Mark Hollis as a more accessible outgrowth of his short-lived post-punk group the Reaction. Talk Talk’s breakthrough sophomore album, In My Life, moved slightly beyond the fairly pedestrian sound of their early XTC/ Duran Duran origins apparent on their debut, but the more complex pop still relied largely on new wave gimmickry and a strategy of compiling singles rather than developing a cohesive album statement. 1986’s The Colour of Spring further developed the intricacies of the band’s instrumentation, the complexity of their musical and lyrical schemes, and the general cohesiveness of their overall sound, to some extent presaging the pastoral pop masterpiece of XTC’s landmark Skylarking by mere months.
A new sound was bubbling just beneath the surface of The Colour of Spring; the potential for a wholly new and dynamic form of music was palpable, due in part to Hollis’ growing isolation from the rest of the band and heavy reliance on dozens of studio musicians to provide a wider sonic palette for rock experimentation. In 1988, after holing himself, the band and an army of studio musicians in the band’s London studio, Hollis and Talk Talk emerged with Spirit of Eden, a self-proclaimed “untourable” album that decisively broke through any artificial constraints of the band’s previous sound. The pop melodrama of Spring was replaced by an earnest aim at a more natural form of musical transcendence.
Notable in the band’s progression on their watershed album was an active rejection of the electronic pretense that characterized the band’s early sound. Some electric organ and guitar, as well as other post-production aural tricks, remain dominant, but for the most part the electronically pre-programmed rigidity that bogged down the band’s early material gave way to loose jam sessions with multiple percussionists and heavily acoustic instrumentation, all of which were fairly far removed from the vocabulary of new wave. Some semblance of a traditional verse-chorus rock song structure remained, but the limitations of structure were stretched to a jazz-like fluidity, with “verses” becoming tense, hypnotic grooves and “choruses” becoming strikingly brief, often cathartic realizations of the building subliminal energy.
Hollis, who at the onset of Talk Talk’s career owed more than a little to Andy Partridge, imploded on Eden, suggesting perhaps the natural conclusion of Partridge’s infamous stage fright. Hollis opted for a hushed, foreboding delivery of vaguely religious lyrics. Like many great poets confronting personal issues of religious origin, Hollis utilizes intentional obliqueness to elucidate a distinct spirituality without perpetuating religious assumptions or presenting definitive conclusions. References to repentance, omnipotent “rage”, and, of course, “spirit”—a word that serves as the complete chorus of “I Believe in You,” (which, somewhat remarkably, is not necessarily about God)—are balanced with succinct secular tirades against material wealth (“Wealth”), judicial corruption (“The Rainbow Song”), and narcissistic self-pity (“Desire”).
The musical complexity and unabashed spiritual slant of Spirit of Eden, along with making touring nearly impossible, effectively limited the band’s audience, which was already maintaining relatively “cult” status. The music might have appealed to adventurous audiences, but the baggage of the band’s synth-pop origins undoubtedly raised skepticism regarding the band’s new direction. Likewise, diehard fans had already accepted a considerable shift in tone with the release of The Colour of Spring, and Eden was an even further cry from any previous Talk Talk album. The band had perhaps evolved too rapidly, not allowing for the gradual growth of a new audience while simultaneously alienating their existing audience.
None of this stopped the band from further redefining the boundaries of their music. Three years after the release of Spirit of Eden, Talk Talk emerged with what would be their enigmatic final release, Laughing Stock. If Eden was Hollis’s tangible expression of intangible religious passion and spirituality, then Laughing Stock is its epistemological opposite. The music and words, most of which are indecipherable without a lyric sheet, are complex, at times frustratingly elliptical, and ultimately inscrutable. But the passion behind the expression is clearer than on any of the group's previous releases. By further obscuring the already vague spiritual imagery and further loosening the already elastic musical arrangements, the “band”—which at this point was essentially Hollis plus studio musicians—finally achieved a natural, progressive sound that cannot be adequately characterized by anything created before or since.
The album’s stand-alone uniqueness is on par with Van Morrison’s Astral Weeks, which itself illuminates spiritual truths behind posed unanswerable questions through perfectly realized artistic unity and connectivity, both in terms of the ensemble’s relationship to one another and Morrison’s relationship to his own material. In short, Laughing Stock expresses the inexpressible, making genre definition moot (a laughing stock?) and truly putting the music in a class of its own, removed from its influences and instead linked primarily to emotion and experience.
“Myrrhman” opens the album with a trembling, uneasy guitar chord, a wavering trumpet note, and some restrained piano. Hollis finally chimes in with some of his most ambiguous lyrics to date: “Place my chair/ At the backroom door/ Help me up/ I can’t wait anymore.” Later mention of a “blessed love” is far more vague than the Christian conception of God apparent on Spirit of Eden, and such ambiguity helps to emphasize atmosphere over a direct message. The song staggers through five minutes of fragile atmospherics until it finally dissolves into an extended bittersweet string ensemble coda.
“Ascension Day” infuses an open-ended slow jam with discordant electric guitar, building to an unexpected anticlimax consisting of a sweet Hollis vocal melody and some thick, gospel-style organ chords. A steady, pulsating beat hints at straight rock music but slides in and out of multiple complex time signatures in a fashion more suggestive of post-bop jazz. Finally, an intense build-up of distorted guitar cuts off abruptly, leading to a reverberating piano tone.
The hypnotic organ pattern of “After the Flood” flows naturally out of the preceding track’s chaos. The song almost instantly clicks into an assured groove that continues uninterrupted for close to ten minutes. This track alone informs countless indie acts to follow, wedding a rhythmic rock backbone to organic drone in a style that Yo La Tengo would help popularize in the mid-nineties.
“Taphead” brings the album back to the opening track’s fragile construction, ratcheting up intensity with a few eerily sparse horn lines distantly approximating the opening track of Miles Davis’s Sketches of Spain. There is a distinct helplessness and hopelessness expressed in the track that undercuts any overt profession of the possibility of spiritual transcendence. Hollis’ lyrics border on cynical, a trait absent from most of his work. He interposes Big Questions (“what worth is upon me”) with concrete images of futility in life (“toughing”/”tear”/“consume”) and finality in death (“dust to dust”). Ultimately, he suggests, questions of spirituality are eternally unknowable, while the limitations of living are constantly, brutally fathomable.
“New Grass” concedes the existence of some kind of spiritual salvation that is actively called into question in “Taproot,” and accentuates its decidedly more optimistic message with uplifting polyrhythmic percussion and gospel organ and piano. “New Grass” is the one song most closely linked in tone to Spirit of Eden, but the track is still markedly subdued, reluctant to embrace any specific religious connotation.
“Runeii” is a quiet, mournful closer, and one of the most stripped-down tracks on the album. Guitars are muddied and placed low in the mix, while vocals and slightly out-of-tune piano are brought to the forefront. The track offers little finality lyrically, directly confronting a “son” who may in fact be Jesus with unsettling calmness. Hollis remarks quietly, “Well aren’t you suspect/ In answer unread,” adding what seems to be an indictment of Christianity: “Apologies met/ An effigy blessed” and, closing the album, “Slow to bleed fair son.” A low guitar growl fades and a simple piano chord—something like the emotional inverse of the Beatles’ “A Day in the Life”—ends the album.
I’ve played Laughing Stock for a few of my friends in the hope that they, too, will come to form an intimate emotional bond with the music. My success rate so far has been nil, and I’ve found that pushing the album on someone guarantees that the person will fail to connect to the music on a deeply personal level. Friends have called the music boring, jam-band-y, and “indie shit.” My Jewish firecracker of a girlfriend went so far as to call it “Christian Rock.” I’m still reeling from that one.
I think that the reason that so many people have failed to connect with the album, and the reason why it’s just now getting some of the attention it has been due for more than a decade, is that a true appreciation of the music requires a kind of consideration unrelated to genre, roots, and general musical preconceptions. My pick of Astral Weeks as my personal favorite album of all time perplexed a few of my friends for the same reason, I think—like Astral Weeks, Laughing Stock cannot be considered in a traditional popular music context. It must serve as a personal, perhaps spiritual, deeply emotional experience, largely absent of historical importance and direct association to other music. I believe that both albums can offer this experience, but certainly not to someone going in with the wrong expectations (as was the case in forcing it upon some of my friends).
Laughing Stock is not for everyone, not as a matter of taste but as a matter of emotional potency of the individual experience. It is not rock, and is not really “post-rock,” though the advent of the genre has provided some clear-cut historical context in which to consider the album—hence the current slew of recent Talk Talk converts, myself included. The album stands alone in my mind as a personal favorite of the 90’s because it exists in a universe free of categorization, beyond “rock” or any other label one might apply. It is simply Laughing Stock.
0 comments
4/04/2004
LIVE IN CONCERT: OH, THE RAPTURE!
I Can't Believe It's Not Better
Well, I've finally seen the Rapture in concert, and as much as I'd hate to narrow-mindedly use the experience as further petty validation of my lukewarm sentiment toward the band in general, I will anyway. Truth be told, the concert was great, with opening bands Starlite Desperation (their hair was about as forced as their band name, but the music was decent...kind of a Darkness meets garage revival sound, but without quite enough satire to bridge the gap) and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club both giving excellent supporting performances. Of course, Peter Hayes of BMRC reminded the crowd that there was no headliner, and honestly it did seem like the crowd was split about 50/50 between Rapture and BMRC fans. Still, it was clear that the Rapture was the feature attraction.
The members of the Rapture onstage are as unassuming as they appear plastered all neon-like on their album cover...they project the same kind of naiveté as the Modern Lovers on the cover of their debut. Their stage show is fairly amateurish, but personal. Lead singer Luke Jenner and bassist Matt Safer frequently arched over the crowd to give a few dozen high fives...although it wouldn't have killed them to jump on down into the crowd and boogie a bit with the rest of us. They blew through their set of dancepunk standards in a little under an hour, returning for two encores after "House of Jealous Lovers" predictably (dance)floored the crowd. "Open Up Your Heart"—a song which, on disc, kills any trace of the momentum of its preceding tracks—also killed the momentum of the show, providing an awkward and unnecessary "cool down" after only four songs.
I suppose I approached the live show with too high expectations, although listening to the album in the car on the way (yeah, I'm one of those people) didn't muster up much extra enthusiasm. I went to a Gogol Bordello show in Boston last week (the show again topped the band's already high standing in my mind as greatest live band of all time, despite Mr. Flacky with Glasses and other killjoy hipster bouncer-types at the uber-stiff Middle East club...) and used their two releases as a warm-up adrenaline rush before the now standard transcendent release to a few hours of first-rate Ukrainian cabaret punk. My friend Abby and I talked to Eugene Hutz for like two whole minutes. I am still in awe.
Anyway...nothing about the show really challenged any of my preconceptions of the Rapture going in. The live show reflects the fact that they just don't have enough compelling material yet to sustain a full-length album. While the show was admittedly excellent, it was also surprisingly hit-and-miss, especially for the purported Indie Band of the Year. I still can't help but think that the Rapture's immense hype has got to be some inexplicable conspiracy amongst indie trendsetters. Maybe I needed a smaller venue (although the place wasn't exactly enormous) or perhaps I honestly "had to be there" before the band was big. I'm dubious of those sorts of claims, though, as they are invariably informed by nostalgia that tends to undercut the actual value of the original experience.
I still maintain that the Rapture is merely a solid post-punk group who fortuitously stumbled onto drum machines at a time when critics were looking for a "different" sound that might make for an interesting music movement. Their simple intention to make feel-good dancepunk seems more genuine live than it comes across on record, and they can sure make a crowd boogie something fierce. But I'd take a fourth Gogol Bordello experience (and will, presumably sometime next fall) before I'd pay to see them again. Besides which, I'll bet Flacky with Glasses has a Rapture poster on the ceiling in his parents' basement.
0 comments
I Can't Believe It's Not Better
Well, I've finally seen the Rapture in concert, and as much as I'd hate to narrow-mindedly use the experience as further petty validation of my lukewarm sentiment toward the band in general, I will anyway. Truth be told, the concert was great, with opening bands Starlite Desperation (their hair was about as forced as their band name, but the music was decent...kind of a Darkness meets garage revival sound, but without quite enough satire to bridge the gap) and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club both giving excellent supporting performances. Of course, Peter Hayes of BMRC reminded the crowd that there was no headliner, and honestly it did seem like the crowd was split about 50/50 between Rapture and BMRC fans. Still, it was clear that the Rapture was the feature attraction.
The members of the Rapture onstage are as unassuming as they appear plastered all neon-like on their album cover...they project the same kind of naiveté as the Modern Lovers on the cover of their debut. Their stage show is fairly amateurish, but personal. Lead singer Luke Jenner and bassist Matt Safer frequently arched over the crowd to give a few dozen high fives...although it wouldn't have killed them to jump on down into the crowd and boogie a bit with the rest of us. They blew through their set of dancepunk standards in a little under an hour, returning for two encores after "House of Jealous Lovers" predictably (dance)floored the crowd. "Open Up Your Heart"—a song which, on disc, kills any trace of the momentum of its preceding tracks—also killed the momentum of the show, providing an awkward and unnecessary "cool down" after only four songs.
I suppose I approached the live show with too high expectations, although listening to the album in the car on the way (yeah, I'm one of those people) didn't muster up much extra enthusiasm. I went to a Gogol Bordello show in Boston last week (the show again topped the band's already high standing in my mind as greatest live band of all time, despite Mr. Flacky with Glasses and other killjoy hipster bouncer-types at the uber-stiff Middle East club...) and used their two releases as a warm-up adrenaline rush before the now standard transcendent release to a few hours of first-rate Ukrainian cabaret punk. My friend Abby and I talked to Eugene Hutz for like two whole minutes. I am still in awe.
Anyway...nothing about the show really challenged any of my preconceptions of the Rapture going in. The live show reflects the fact that they just don't have enough compelling material yet to sustain a full-length album. While the show was admittedly excellent, it was also surprisingly hit-and-miss, especially for the purported Indie Band of the Year. I still can't help but think that the Rapture's immense hype has got to be some inexplicable conspiracy amongst indie trendsetters. Maybe I needed a smaller venue (although the place wasn't exactly enormous) or perhaps I honestly "had to be there" before the band was big. I'm dubious of those sorts of claims, though, as they are invariably informed by nostalgia that tends to undercut the actual value of the original experience.
I still maintain that the Rapture is merely a solid post-punk group who fortuitously stumbled onto drum machines at a time when critics were looking for a "different" sound that might make for an interesting music movement. Their simple intention to make feel-good dancepunk seems more genuine live than it comes across on record, and they can sure make a crowd boogie something fierce. But I'd take a fourth Gogol Bordello experience (and will, presumably sometime next fall) before I'd pay to see them again. Besides which, I'll bet Flacky with Glasses has a Rapture poster on the ceiling in his parents' basement.
0 comments
Amps for Christ- The People at Large (5 Rue Christine, 2004)
Henry Barnes of Amps for Christ: Oh great and powerful Nostradamus, I fear the end of the world is upon us. I’d like to make an eclectic 23-track concept album about the subject. What would you recommend?
Nostradamus: My son, the end of the world is foretold with hyphens. Al-Queda, 9-11, A-bomb, Bush-Cheney...all hyphenated. What is your musical specialty?
HB: Lo-fi experimental indie-folk-rock.
N: An excellent start. Now add hyphens. Indian music is pretty cool, and vaguely foreboding. Also try free-association poetry. Lots of hyphens there.
HB: I wrote this sorta heavy metal piece, too.
N: Record the metal song in the black box of an airplane and give it a snappy title like “Use Use Use.” People will think the end of the world is upon them—which it is. So what do we have now?
HB: Electro-acoustic-avant-indie-folk-rock-mini-raga-pop-roots-Americana with free-associative-Beefheart-meets-Biafra poetry and lo-fi-black-box-noise-rock. Oh, and two deconstructions of “Auld Lang Syne.” Wow, that does sound apocalyptic. But isn’t it...well, isn’t it all a bit arbitrary?
N: The end of the world is arbitrary.
HB: Yeah, but will my album actually be good?
N: That, my son, is entirely beside the point.
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