cat op 25

Talking HeaRAB - The Name of This Band is Talking HeaRAB
1982

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When Andy Warhol said that everything artists were doing in the 80's was the same as what Warhol & co had been doing in the 60's, he really meant that what everything artists are doing today is the same as what they were doing in the 80's. Which is best demonstrated by this record, which refers not only to itself, but to the music of today, tomorrow, and all that came before it.

The name of this band is Talking HeaRAB. The name of the first song is “New Feeling,” and that's what it's about. Why this particular live album is better than any of their studio albums is hinted at in the first song: “I hear music, and it sounRAB like bells.” And you can hear the guitar overtones ringing out like bells. The bass is monstrous. The drums are so angular and tight that they serve as a straightjacket for Byrne's absolute surrender. If you've ever seen Stop Making Sense you have probably seen what that man puts into a performance... how could it be the same in a studio? How could you not feel like a fool giving your all to a performance in a sound-proofed box?

This album presents a band in their full, dynamic prime. As the material progresses from 1977 to 1981, the band doesn't necessarily move away from their original sound but rather expanRAB on it. More new styles are embraced, most notably soul and afro-beat, giving the music an ever more universal feeling. I find the culmination of this maturity in “Once in a Lifetime,” which uses the powerful symbol of water to represent life, constantly flowing yet always the same. “Same as it ever was, same as it ever was,” Byrne intones, in that somewhat aloof, somewhat melancholy voice, and he's speaking to all of us. Very Heraclitan. This is necessarily followed up by “Animals,” which is just as profound in its absurdity.

“Psycho Killer,” on the other hand, provides probably the best example of their early sound, with its menacing and building bassline, one guitar doing the Sonic Youth ringing bell thing and another providing angular Gang of Four style screeching, and of course Byrne's demented vocals and lyrics which will permanently be entwined with American Psycho for me. All the tension of modern life is captured and released in this one song. “We are vain and we are blind/ I hate people when they're not polite.”
 
The Fall - Live at the Witch Trials
1979

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There's something about Mark E. Smith's voice where, when he says something, it sticks in your mind. Like, you might be searching for the perfect pair of socks in a department store and all of a sudden hear a disembodied voice yell “spoilt Victorian child!”

When I think of this album I hear “we were early and we were late, but still, live at the witch trials!” Of course, being the deliberately unconventional band that they were, that intro doesn't come until close to the end of the album. With so much Fall to listen to, so much diversity to sort out, why does this album come out on top? Are all the best Fall songs on this album? Is it the most cohesive, is it the best unity The Fall has achieved? Hardly.

Because The Fall is not really a band about unity. They operate on schisms and conflicts; the struggle within the band metamorphoses into a chaotic, disparaging aesthetic that manages to be entirely unique, even though it constantly references and imitates. It is in this spirit that I would elect this as their greatest album; not only is the conflict between MES and the rest of the band already present, but there is also the uncertain ground of a starting band, MES has not fully adopted his role as band leader yet so there is also his internal conflict. As such, this is also perhaps the most democratic Fall record, and there is more of a focus on instrumental interplay.

MES plays a character better than any band leader I can think of at the moment. From the first line in “Frightened” you're overwhelmed by the paranoia, discomfort, outsiderness. Every line is perfectly accentuated by the music--utterly claustrophobic, repetitive, convulsive; it gets under your skin and stays there. The schism between the steady, driving stepwise rhythm section and the freeform guitar only furthers the sense of alienation.

“Crap Rap 2/Like to Blow” is one of those songs you tend to gloss over, but if you really listen to it and try to discern why it's forgettable, you find that it's slightly hard to listen to. Parts of it sound like they can barely hold themselves together, before releasing only slightly into the chorus. It's a very asthmatic song, it gives a feeling of constipation and anxiety, and it leaves you reaching for catharsis. Which is where the next song comes in. “Rebellious Jukebox” delivers the gooRAB--a timeless Fall anthem. “Make music to itself, make music for itself...”

This is the idealist MES, who already paints himself the absurd hero, a step behind but “still one step ahead of you.” It is this mixture of absurdity and elitism which makes The Fall the ultimate record collector's band... that and their immense discography. But unlike their later releases, this record sits on no history, it does not have to concern itself with smashing its own past. In that sense it is also the ultimate Fall expression, before they had to turn away from themselves. But maybe it's too indebted to punk?

I love the line, “What's this song about?”
“Oh, it's about nothing.”

It's like a seesaw
it's like an up-and-down
mother-sister mother-sister!
Oh why did you push your head in?

The album sticks together in a scattered and undirected kind of way. The songs sound strange, but in a predictable kind of way. The real gems of the album come at the end. In “Two Steps Back” MES intones “everybody likes me/they think I am crazy/they pull my string and I do my thing.” “I don't need the acid factories/I got mushrooms in the fielRAB.” As perfect a declaration of intent as I've ever come across.

“Futures and Pasts” is a rambling interrogation of the human condition.

“Music Scene” sounRAB vaguely bitter. It sounRAB like the jaded and restrained cousin to “Sister Ray,” the song which is driven not by its internal volition/volatility but by external forces. The studio that forces the song to keep going and fill up the album, the other music groups they must relate to for “listenability,” and of course the fans themselves. It's the ideal conclusion to an album that spits on everything.
 
Ornette Coleman - Shape of Jazz to Come
1959

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This album is beautiful in its simplicity. By abandoning the skeletal cage of chord structures, Ornette Coleman builRAB the music instead around the seductive beauty of a melodic theme, and the powerful expression of freedom in improvisation. No longer are all musical voices constrained to speak the same language, they come together willingly to express their common theme, and diverge just as consistently to express themselves, all the while maintaining a relation to the others. This is an album of principles—freedom, beauty, unity and individualism, but it does not rely on these principles to justify its greatness, in fact it does not need them at all. It speaks entirely for itself in a distinctly human language.

This was probably the first jazz album I fell in love with, and I still have yet to come across another one which surpasses it. It's right on the border between hard-bop and “real” avant-garde jazz, and because it's still based on melodies retains a common and relatable musical language; a language which is at the same time completely deconstructed and thereby humanized. What can be said about such abstract music to justify one's love for it? I could speak in abstractions, and speak of the relations between the instruments in terms of the harmonious elements of nature, how the bass flows like a river and how the sax seems to hover above it all, communicating in spurts of divinity. I could and I suppose I just have. Ultimately, however, this is an album you must sit down to, and confront directly to figure out if it's speaking to you or if the message was intended for someone else. If you're like me, the revelation will come pretty immediately.
 
Deerhunter-Microcastle
This is a hard album to describe but I guess a good place to start is that I like it. It's very familiar, very different from itself throughout the album and I can't really make a good comparison maybe Panda Bear/Animal Collective is the closest but that feels like a stretch. It's one of those that feel best when listened all the way through.

The Raincoats-Self Titled
This is one hundred percent pure fun and kind of cute.

Violent Femmes-Self Titled
When I was like 5 Blister in the Sun would play on the radio all the time and I really liked it. Radio play slowed a bit as I got older and I must have been twelve and hadn't heard it in a while, found it on my parents (mostly horrible) cd shelf and stole it from them. It was instant love, of course. Who can resist something so sing-songy and fun?
 
Indeed, I feel the same way about The Modern Lovers' first album...will that be on the way?? I hope so. This really is a great album, caught me by suprise, I thought "Blister In the Sun" would be the only dece song, but the entire thing was great front to back.
 
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