Epitaph

I realize that I mostly keep to the rock arena, but I'm compelled to write a brief note on Lena Horne, who passed away on May 9th. No one can pretend to enjoy so-called Easy Listening music without having heard her voice. And since I hadn't, in respect to her, I popped in Stormy Weather.

Quite simply, if you haven't yet heard that CD, go do so. Lena had a voice of liquid crystal, one which didn't just sing the right notes, but would catch thoses notes and make them earn their keep. Like Tony Bennett, she clearly had a great respect for her source material, and a verve for the telling; a spin for each individual song that made even the novelty numbers as powerful and dynamic as the torch ballads.

She was also in quite a few Hollywood musicals, and while I'm sure we can argue about the merits of those, one can't but admire her elegance and glamourous air. By the time she got to the Stormy Weather album in 1956, the squeaky-clean delivery from the fourties (such as in the orginal cut of Stormy Weather) was being supplanted by a brimstone flair, but the glamour never went away.

She was a class act, a dear and wonderful singer who had her Moment, had her success, and has left us a marvelous recorded legacy. Wherever she is now, God bless.

As to the album Stormy Weather, I don't actually have any clue how to review an album not of rock lineage. I'm inclined to say just go track it down and let it speak for itself. As with most records of that age, it's short. Only a half hour. And the lady never put a foot wrong. She saved the rather quaint lyrics of Tomorrow Mountain, gave all the fast songs jive (it's honestly just a fun CD to listen to) and the timbre of her voice made all the torchy moments hit home.

There was only one Lena Horne. Now I just wonder why it took me so long to get around to listening to her...

One of the new wave girls...

Return of the Giant Slits. Four and a half stars.

I'll begin by saying there is no guarantee (whatever your musical preference) that
you'll like this. The Slits stepped out of the punk arena and into new wave. But since that's almost as generic an umbrella term as "rock" it's not much help.

Put simply, this is just plain weird. It's quite daring and innovative for its time, highly experimental and decidedly uncommercial. It's been doomed to obscurity, of course.

Though the Slits have had numerous men in the band (notably Budgie, who went on to higher profile work in Siouxsie and the Banshees), they've always been considered a girl band and the focus has always been on Ari Upp, frontwoman and singer of amazing distinction. Throughout this, their second album, released in 1981, what stands out first is her fascinating, wandering voice, which interprets lyrics seemingly regardless of their meaning. She leaps up and down the scale, warbles and howls like a half-mad jungle native, ranging from playful to angry and back again, and slurring her words so much that it's hopeless to try and make sense of them.

The music almost equals Ari and her backup singers in the bizarre, since it trips along on afro-centric beats and rhythms.

I own the Japanese import of the CD and I don't know if that's the reason it opens with the closing song Earthbeat...in Japanese. You certainly couldn't find a less accessable way to open an album if you tried. Driven by tribal drums, any melody it may have possessed is knocked off center by the odd handling of Japanese. It also features Ari doing her best attempt at a bird call, adding to the generally exotic flavour.

Or What It is? takes up English. Its time signature is all crosseyed, forever halting just when it starts to go somewhere. The sheer amount of strange percussion, including rattles, and Ari in prima-donna overdrive, makes it a continuation of eccentricity; but the second half of the song takes up a gradual fade on a chorus that, coming from these ladies, is downright appealing.

Face Place kicks in with trombone, juxtaposing an almost sinister with the more light-hearted tempos of a carnival. Three piece harmonies practicing vocal acrobatics... it's like the Boswell Sisters channeling Yoko Ono, and it sounds as fresh as the day it was recorded.

Walk About is the most appealing song on the whole record, possessing a cool, funky riff and a fascinating vocal line. It wasn't a single, and would have gone nowhere if it had, but one can dream...

Difficult Fun takes up flute, the sort of synth one hears on a lot of eighties fantasy films and soaring vocals.

Animal Space/Spacier is one of the darker tracks. The lyrics are a little more comprehensible, but it's really Ari that makes these tracks what they are. This one has a good guitar solo on it. And the "spacier" part is the instrumental only section, which is chaotic, yet with a distinct method to the madness that keeps the beat up front and keeps the jamming from going too far off the mark.

Horns take up Improperly Dressed. The chorus shows off her higher register warbling nicely, though it's a bit too out-there and chaotic, from a melodic standpoint, for my taste.

Life on Earth is decidedly ominous. Ari goes into higher register, backed by a far from heavenly choir. They sound a bit tormented, forming a strange contradiction to the more playful main vocal. It dissolves at the end into what sounds like a tribal funeral lament, and all the instruments fall away.

Then it's the English version of Earthbeat. And it's just as odd as the Japanese. Driven by that same drumming, it's somewhat shorter.

It took me a few listens to really even begin to appreciate the various and sundry oddities Return of the Giant Slits has to offer. The Slits are not for everyone, and I wouldn't blame a person for being far less enthusiastic than me over this album. It was the last thing the band did, and far from an all-occasions CD. I've described it to the best of my ability. Now you'll just have to track it down yourself.

And in the end...

Let It Be. Four and a half stars.

Iconic, isn't it?

It's my pet theory that 1970 was a dismal capstone to the public who'd been through the golden era of the 60s. New talent was rising everywhere you turned, yet many of the "old gaurd" as it were, failed to make it through. Woodstock had already failed to change the world, or even the music festival, as the recent Isle of Wight indicated. The Stones had lost Brian Jones. Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix were both casualties of the rock lifestyle and it must have looked like Eric Clapton was following suit. Dylan had turned his back on everyone, releasing the outrageous Self Portrait. Even the endearing team Simon and Garfunkel, who were at the peak of success and had just won a Grammy, couldn't keep it together.

Then there were the Beatles. The beloved Fab Four who had started it all. And they broke up amidst much public rancor. It was common knowledge that McCartney was suing his former band mates, Lennon was busy exorcising his demons and Harrison was assembling a regular rock orchestra in preparation to blow everyone's mind with a triple LP success. Amidst all of this, Let It Be was released.

Let it Be is a curiously maligned Beatle disc, perhaps because everyone heard it after the production marvel of Abbey Road, though it was actually recorded first. It was designed to sound rough - their intent was to distance themselves from the tricked out studio releases of the past few years. So there's a lot of studio chatter (provided by John Lennon) and a lot of throwaway tunes.

Unfortunately these plans went awry and Phil Spector got his hands on the tapes and did overdubs, leaving the record to swerve between overproduction and simple roots rock.

John opens the record with a mock intro, then Two of Us kicks off. It's one of Let It Be's crowning achievements; a lovely acoustic duet (impeccably harmonized) between John and Paul. It's got a beautiful refrain from Paul and a laid-back, almost pastoral feel.

One false start later and Dig a Pony starts. It's a guitar dominated rock tune, with a lyric that John later dismissed as rubbish. You can see why. It's such nonsense it might have been written in a day. That doesn't stop it from being enjoyable, of course. It has a rough charm to it.

Across the Universe is a classic, despite the Spector treatment it gets. From this era, it is Lennon's signature tune. Has an out-there lyric and an haunting delivery. It sticks with you.

I Me Mine is a Harrison contribution. Considering what he had in storage, this is a curiously light offering. I've never been a fan of the chorus, but the plaintive verses about human self-centeredness ring true. It's only two minutes long, but that's an epic compared to the next one.

Dig It is a tiny excerpt from a massive jam. It fades in with John leading the charge, so to speak, and then fades out at less than 50 seconds... It adds character to the album, of course.

Let It Be is a masterpiece. Paul's finest moment for the foreseeable future. Spector doesn't damage it, as the sweep and grandeur of the song smothers him, not the other way around (See The Long and Winding Road). It sounds religious, but it isn't at all. Listen to it when you're down. You'll feel better.

Maggie May is a traditional song. Lennon adopts a thick accent and proceeds to knock out about thirty seconds of it. Impossibly, it's shorter than Dig It. Again, character...

I've Got a Feeling is an interesting experiment. It starts as a McCartney throwaway, a not quite finished heavy rocker. Then, without missing a beat, it morphs into an even more incomplete Lennon bit. They'd done this sort of thing before (notably A Day in the Life), but never quite like this.

Another experiment is unveiled with One After 909, a song written in the early years of the Beatles, then brought out and dusted off for inclusion on this disc. Were they short of material? Perhaps. But the end result is a success.

The Long and Winding Road, a sad piano ballad from McCartney's pen, is next. It's awful. Spector finally saps the Beatles. Any emotional power it might have had is smothered underneath strings and a choir. Paul was furious, and damn, I don't blame him at all. Where was Martin when you needed him?

For You Blue is another Harrison throwaway. It's memorable for the woozy slide guitar. I Me Mine is the better contribution. It bears repeated listening better. Not that this is a bad song, especially if you like George.

So...the last track it the adored Get Back, a bouncy, instantly catchy little number which for some strange reason I have never warmed up to. It's a foot stomper, roots rock in action...I just don't like it very much.

Lennon ends the record with another bit of tongue in cheek mockery. Really, more than ever, you can hear the group splintering on this record. It's a constant tug of war between John and Paul, with George sticking his nose in when he can and Ringo minding his own business behind the drum kit. None of the rampant dislike going on behind the scenes makes it onto the record, but just viewing all the throwaway songs included, and the cover, where each of the four gets their own solitary portrait, and it's plain to see that as a band, things were over between them.

That they shelved this admirably messy LP and set aside their differences long enough to craft a cohesive swansong is another story. For what it's worth, I have always liked Let It Be, warts and all, far better than Abbey Road.

The troubadour's odds and sods album

Thanks for the votes from last time, people....This image is a bit smaller than the last one, partly for economical reasons. But it's not at all a good cover, and like Odessey and Oracle, it is not a good representation of what you'll find inside.

Mellow Yellow. Four stars.

Donovan Leitch really is in some ways the epitome of the sixties hippie ideal. By combining light folk leanings with trippy pop tunes and heavy brushes of psychedelia he manages to completely sum up one whole aspect of the counterculture of the time. He's also light, whimsical, twee. Naturally a bit dated.

Yet these are not bad things. They add to the music's charm, certainly. And Donovan has a lovely Scottish lilt to his voice and is a capable songwriter.

Prior to listening the only song I was familiar with on this 1967 album was the title track, which as it turns out was not at all representative of sound or quality. Mellow Yellow sports a punchy brass band and a lyric that is complete nonsense. There's a school of thought that believe Paul McCartney is doing backup vocals but (unless he's the one whooping it up in the background) I think that's a hoax. I don't really like this song, to be frank.

But that's no problem, because with Writer in the Sun quality goes way up. A gentle, swaying song, featuring a pastoral flute or two. It was written several years earlier when Donovan had believed his career to be over. The resignation and sorrow come across beautifully and the lyrics are far beyond the previous offering.

Sand and Foam has a dark, elegant guitar and the lyrics are so highly poetic as to be nearly incomprehensible the first time. This gives the whole thing a mysterious vibe and it's another highlight.

The Observation is very short, more memorable for the jazzy backup band than either melody or song. But it still gives proof of what an odd lyricist Donovan really is, as he uses the simplist rhymes imaginable (hustling and bustling, mellow yellow, trip out skip out flip out, etc) and can turn around and deliver something really accomplished and poetic - sometimes in the same song.

Bleak City Woman is another light moment. Innocuous and not at all memorable, but there you have it.

House of Jansch is the opposite. Instantly memorable with a very interesting lyric. Why? Because while nothing about it indicates it's a happy song, there's nothing especially sad about it either. Two minute pop songs are usually more overt than that. The title has nothing to do with the song contents, and seems to be meant as a tribute to one Bert Jansch, another Scot, one who founded the band Pentangle.

The real tour de force comes with Young Girl Blues. The voice is way too loud in the mix, and the fadeout is a bit too quick, but other than that! It gets your attention right away, more so with the pauses after every dour verse. "Blues" in a title is usually misleading, but this track is actually quite harrowing and dismal.

With Museum it returns to typical Donovan. A hip, swinging number to enjoy.

Hampstead Incident. Now listen to that guitar. Doesn't that sound a lot like the acoustic passage opening Babe I'm Gonna Leave You? Otherwise it's another dark track, this time featuring strings and an evocative lyric. I really like Donovan's darker work.

But it ends with Sunny South Kensington, a name-dropping, fast paced song. Donovan ditches his Scottish croon for a rather harsher voice, the sort used on his famous Sunshine Superman song. Good music anyway.

Oh, keep in mind, not one of these songs rocks, not even slightly. That really wasn't his forte. Some of them bounce a bit, is all.

Extra facts: Mellow Yellow is in fact not a proper recording at all, at least not from one complete session. It combines leftovers from the Sunshine Superman album, a single or two, and other odds and ends. This may explain the continuously shifting lineup of incidental instruments, or that may just be part of Donovan's style.

However, it does explain the lack of information about the session players. I've heard that it's Danny Thompson on double bass, and that John Paul Jones did arrangements. Based on the McCartney rumour, I'll take such info with a grain of salt.

Otherwise, all I have to say is that this is a nice little record. Fun and moody by degrees, and a good candidate for my list of afternoon tea comfort CDs.

Now in technicolour

Okay, this is an experiment, to see if I can jazz up my Blog by adding pictures and fancy elements...

Odessey and Oracle. Five stars.

Most people are unfamiliar with the Zombies, so here's a bit of background for their only proper album. Released in 1968, after the Zombies had been together for years, releasing single after single that went nowhere. They were never popular in England, though they did get two number one hits across the pond in America (one of which is included here).

In '68, they were ready and willing to call it quits. They were on a new label (CBS), had booked time in Abbey Road, produced themselves and broke up with minimum rancor upon completion.

Ironically, the track Time of the Season became a huge hit when released in America and there were calls for the band to reform. They refused, perhaps not wishing to exploit their success, and as Rod Argent said "it would have been a real downer if we had regrouped and then failed."

Argent was one of the two songwriters of the group, the other being Chris White. Colin Blunstone took distinctive lead vocals for most tracks. Hugh Grundy was the drummer, Paul Atkinson the guitarist, White the bass player. Argent played everything else.

I've never done the whole music history lesson before, but I thought I'd give it a try. Vote on whether you like these changes, please. Now, what about the music?

It's Mellotron heavy, very British pop songs, impeccably crafted with superb harmonies and backups. And surprisingly strong songwriting.

The opener, Care of Cell 44, is a bright, jubilant number about how happy out narrator is that his girlfriend is soon to be released from prison. Just listen to those backing vocals. They put the Beach Boys to shame, almost.

A Rose for Emily is a simple, melancholy piano tune. Without any experimentation or psychedelia, making the story a rather odd theme for a pop song, added to by the matter-of-fact voice.

Maybe After He's Gone is in more familiar territory, a poetic broken-heart song with a surpringly optomistic chorus.

Beechwood Park is a beautiful, elegant ode with some surprising quirks and a gentle melody.

Brief Candles also manages to carry a good melody and a thought-provoking lyric. It's quite beautiful.

Hung up on a Dream turns to describing hippies. It sweeps along almost thematically and is highly poetic. Most of these tracks are, yet none of them come across as pretentious.

Changes (how many songs are called that, anyhow?) juxtaposes a harmonised chorus backed by spare drumming with a certain music hall set of verses that have an infectious melody. It feels a little half-baked, but it makes for a great curiousity.

Everything perks up with I Want Her She Wants Me. It's a jaunty song, featuring gentle verses that clash with a slightly grating harmonised chorus. The rest of the the harmonies are beautiful, of course.

This Will be Our Year is also cheerful, or as cheerful as Colin Blunstone can sound with his voice. It's a bit hammy, like a showtune, but the overall quality is very pleasing.

Which makes Butcher's Tale (Western Front 1914) all the more shocking. It's a stark view of war, sung by Chris White in a raw voice free of harmonic backups. There's spooky tape loops and organ instead. A sore thumb on the record but a damn good one.

Everything gets sunny on Friends of Mine, a sweet little song about having one's faith in life reaffirmed by seeing friends in love. The chorus listing off half a dozen couples is so charmingly twee that I smile everytime. Even back then, people avoided such bubblegum tendencies in the hopes of being taken seriously...

Time of the Season is the icing on the cake, a soulful, sultry gem. It is immaculate. There isn't a a flaw in the song. The Zombies knew what they were doing in the studio, and again, just listen to the backup voices. It's perfect and deservedly a monster hit.

Okay, it's art/baroque pop with a British slant, and naturally a bit light. But if you like The Kinks are the Village Green Preservation Society or Deram era Bowie, there is a good chance you'll enjoy this. I know I do.

One more from the well of darkness...

Mask. Four Stars.

With their second album, goth rockers Bauhaus picked up a bit of much-needed finesse, without losing much in the way of energy. Musically, little has altered from In the Flat Field. It's still punkish thrashing with a creepy edge. And Peter Murphy still goes off the deep end every chance he gets.

Yet there is a higher quality to the songs themselves. They have a clearer structure, making them more accessible overall.

Hair of the Dog doesn't make any of the small changes immediately noticable. It goes for chaos and the contrast between the dark backbeat and the strange guitar is quite interesting.

Passion of Lovers is a Bauhaus classic. It's very strong, with a sordid lyric mangled by Peter's odd phrasing, plenty of real atmosphere in the music, more weird guitar and a memorable chorus. The backup vocals are a nice touch.

Of Lillies and Remains is a strange little piece. Bouncy, spacey filler. It never really becomes music, as the lyrics are spoken, not sung. It's a bizarre "tune," and though it starts deadpan, Peter does his usual job on the later verses. I'm at a loss about it. Is it supposed to be funny?

Dancing sounds like an extra from their debut, a leftover. It's messy, the lyric is useless and Peter does a lot of yelling...

Hollow Hills is what I truly expected Bauhaus to be like - before I heard any of them. Perhaps the reason for my disappointment. It's a crawling dirge where all the band sound like they're far away. Good lyric, and my favorite track from Mask.

Kick in the Eye 2 (where is 1?) is positively danceable. It's a fun track, with dramatic (not histrionic) vocals from Peter. I can't say more than that.

In Fear of Fear is a light, slightly obnoxious little number. It's a decent followup to Kick. I do like the way Peter juxtaposes his voice by singing twice in higher and lower register.

Muscle in Plastic contains their second reference to Nyjinsky (a ballet dancer who was diagnosed with schizophrenia). Dancing also references him. It's a manic song, without any overdubbing on Peter's voice.

The Man with the X-Ray Eyes is more typical of the CD. Creepy yet incomprehensible lyric and a pretty good climax where the typical wailing corresponds with peppy backups.

Mask also showcases the singer gaining a degree of subtlety that's nice to hear. This is the end of the original release and is quite strong.

Bonuses again included. In Fear of Dub is basically an instrumental edition of In Fear of Fear. Why?

Ear Wax, which seems to have been named that just because, is entirely unmemorable, but atmospheric.

Harry,also named so for no reason, is even stranger. It feels like a British Invasion pop song. Likable, but undeniably odd. It proves how eclectic Bauhaus really was.

The painfully titled 1. David Jay 2. Peter Murphy 3. Kevin Haskins 4. Daniel Ash is actually very good. It opens as a piano driven piece with one of the other guys singing about a law suit or something. Dry run for Love and Rockets. Then it grooves up and Peter takes over with a totally worthless but very funny lyric about fish and potatoes. It's ludicrous to be sure. Then it slows down and another segment (cautionary and not so memorable) finishes the "song." The whole thing is so bizarre it's a standout.

Satori holds promise to start, and features choppy singing in another language. It fades out and then an instrumental percussion fest fades back in. This lasts a while and desists. End of bonus tracks.

Overall, though I like Mask better than In the Flat Field and would listen to more Bauhaus if I had it, I can't say I like them very much. I'm not a fan, as they seem to be the classic example of the mixed bag. They're influential, they popularised Goth Rock alongside Siouxsie and the Banshees, but I prefer their later incarnations, once Murphy had learned how to sing. :)

And so, from the well of darkness...

In the Flat Field. Three and a half Stars.

The revered forefathers of goth rock. Peter Murphy, the stylised Transylvanian Count, and a backup band that would eventually become Love and Rockets. Knowing them both in their later stages, I was curious to here the original material.

If you ask me, it's a bit like introducing listeners to Iggy Pop via The Idiot and then giving them Raw Power...

My version of In The Flat Field contains a variety of bonus material, leaving it difficult to discern how it would have come across in shortened form. But I digress.

Dark Entries is a good pace and tone setter. Driving guitars, and an incomprehensible lyric delivered at speed with odd phrasing, all complicating matters. No melody. Sounds like punk rock.

Double Dare has fat, distorted guitars and ominous drums. Peter Murphy sings like he's before an audience hung up on his every word. He stretches all his lines to the breakng point while the music rises steadily in volume.

In the Flat Field doesn't rest for long. That drummer goes into overdrive, while Murphy goes conventional with actual verses and a chorus. He does some cool things with his voice, but he's a bit too fond of screaming. That happens a lot here, which does rob some power from the proceedings.

God in an Alcove is a step in the right direction. A bit restrained musically.I think it's impossible to retrain Murphy though.

Dive is like Dark Entries 2. Punk Thrashing, never letting up the pace. I think Murphy is trying to be hard to understand on purpose. Short.

Spy in the Cab again teeters on finesse. Musically it's really quite atmospheric. Peter's vocal histrionics kind of do it in.

Small Talk Stinks (complete with incomprehensible, tinny voices in the back) is... really weird. It's almost funny ("There's no idle gossip in braille"), but also nicely unsettling with those tinny voices taking over toward the end.

St. Vitus Dance is light. I don't think Bauhaus were quite as dismal as the goth tag might sound. Peter really camps this one nicely. But then he gets up and screams it out. Maybe he enjoyed it... But I don't.

The crucifixion is given the rock treatment with Stigmata Martyr. It adheres musically to all the record. Cold, guitar-heavy post-punk. Actually, come to think of it, it really sounds a hell of a lot like The Scream.

Nerves is brilliant. The opening build up is truly nerve-wracking, using our fear of sudden, quiet noises to perfection before expanding. This is the end of the original album, and even though Murphy does some yelling here, being as the song is a seven minute build-and-subside experiment, it really comes across as far more compelling than anything prior to it.

Extras.. Telegram Sam, a reimagining of that classic T. Rex song. Instead of a straight version, there's a manic and somewhat silly quality to the cover. It's fast and almost charming, if that's possible from these guys.

Rosegarden Funeral of Sores is a John Cale song. It fits well with Bauhaus originals, being rather dismal and dirge-like. It's worth waiting for the eventual delivery of the title phrase. It has more impact that way.

Terror Couple Kill Colonel actually carries a melody. Must have been a single, for it's a shame to think of wasting that potential. It's about a murder, of course, but still accessable.

Scopes is utterly trivial. A minute and a half of Peter listing off a variety of scopes with backing vocals chanting "scope!" Lame. But Bauhaus had to be a group that was either way too serious or secretly having a laugh to make this type of music. Scopes backs up the latter.

Untitled is a bit of jamming with our singer muttering something at the same time. Makes no difference what it is, as it's no longer than Scopes.

God in an Alcove plays again. Remixed or an alternate take or something. It's a little different, but nothing important.

Crowds is an extraordinary turn of events. Peter Murphy sings to a lover he doesn't like so much anymore. It's amazing. Just gentle piano based stuff to back him up, with him just wringing real emotion from this sad, angry, betrayed rant. I'm still impressed by it.

Last is an unlisted bonus, a remix of Terror Couple Kill Colonel. Really irrelevent as well, except to Bauhaus fanatics.

Of which I am not one. Though this debut was more eccentric than I'd anticipated, and grew on me as I compiled this review, still moreso it frustrated me with fine hints of what it could be, but lacked the focus or wisdom to achieve.

At least on this outing. Maybe on their next and only other CD I own, they will refine their sound.