ARTHUR BROWN: KINGDOM COME (1972)
1) The Teacher; 2) A
Scientific Experiment; 3) The Whirlpool; 4) The Hymn; 5) Water; 6) Love Is (The
Spirit That Will Never Die); 7) City Melody; 8) Traffic Light Stop.
Galactic
Zoo Dossier might have been a
mess, but it had promise. This follow-up is quite disappointing, since it
sort of fails to deliver on that promise. Shedding some of the theatrical grandness
of its predecessor, it compensates with extra noises, extra nonsense, and a spoonful
of bathroom humor masquerading as Artistic Metaphor. I don't know about Tales From Topographic Oceans, but Kingdom Come could just as easily be
dubbed one of the reasons punk had to happen — not because rock music had
become too complex and intellectualized, but because it had lost its focus.
Even Arthur Brown circa 1968 actually used it to say something. God damn me if
I have the least idea of what it is he is trying to say here.
The first nine and a half minutes of the album
are given over to a messy prog/R'n'B hybrid suite which delights in changing
its melody every next minute, uses the metaphor of The Teacher to emphasize the
fact that Arthur is still trying to
open our minds... and heavily invests in lyrical references to the discharging
of liquid and semi-liquid substances, including (warning!) an entire section on the adventures of Arthur's
sphincter, set to fart noises, so make sure there aren't any minors in your
presence when you are playing this, or the next generation will forever remember
Arthur as «that guy who farts on his records», even though he only did it once
(I hope).
The next
to last section of the album, on
the other hand, represents some sort of mystical journey through uncharted
waters, with Mr. Brown pretending to be the captain and others informing him,
over and over again, that he is not.
The non-musical parts of it try to be funny and fail, then try to be wise and
fail just as well. Basically, there is just too much here: the pot is so
thoroughly overloaded with ingredients that the final result is inedible.
ʽCity Melodyʼ, in particular, is a great example of why «complete musical
freedom» should never be praised as the highest of values: three minutes of
tight, but not very inspired jamming simply do not form any sensible unity with
the other three minutes of sound collages (various city noises). But do listen
to this stuff if you have an innate allergy to musique concrète — it might help you gain more love for ʽRevolution
#9ʼ, whose apocalyptic streak of sonic terror can be nerve-wrecking, unlike the
utterly boring sonic collages of Brown and Co.
Which is all too bad, because all the wordy
garbage, failed humor, tired collaging, and excessive overdubbing tends to
overshadow the fact that, for this album, the band actually took the time to
write a small handful of very good songs. ʽThe Hymnʼ and ʽLove Is (The Spirit)ʼ
are the most radiant joy-senders to come out of the Brown camp, for instance —
in fact, their radiance is very much at odds with the far more somber,
negatively charged attitude exhibited by Zoo
Dossier. Where ʽSunriseʼ was a Brown aria of anger and despair, framed by
accordingly virulent guitar solos, ʽThe Hymnʼ is a Brown aria of unprecedented
optimism, framed by accordingly euphoric guitar passages featuring what might
probably count as Andy Dalby's best work ever. And ʽLove Is (The Spirit)ʼ is a
fine example of an early proto-power-ballad done right — no power chords or high-pitched operatic pathos.
Best of the lot is saved for the end, though,
if you live long enough to get to it: ʽTraffic Light Songʼ is a mean-and-lean
funk jam that manages to stay in place for almost
all of its three-minute duration, with just a few seconds, perhaps, of being interrupted
by an occasional extraneous piano riff or something. It is a «conceptual» tune,
too, of course, because the album begins with «the teacher» conducting a
«scientific experiment» by «trying to stimulate the brain of this traffic
light» (yes, that should give you a pretty decent idea about whatever it is you
might be going to subject yourself to). But that's precisely the point: all
things «conceptual» about this record have dated so badly that, for all I know,
they might already have seem dated back in 1972 (and they probably were: Frank
Zappa was doing this sort of chaotic shit with Absolutely Free as early as 1967, and Brown is no match for Frank
when it comes to pushing chaotic shit on the listener). Its melodic side, on
the other hand, can still be salvaged from the rubble — except that most people
probably will not bother, and I cannot blame them. If it takes sitting through
the peripeteia of Arthur Brown's sphincter in order to get through to ʽThe
Hymnʼ, one might even be excused for stubbornly sticking to Freddie Mercury.
"Let's face it — a sense of humor is a
good thing", a reviewer on Amazon said in order to justify the extra
silliness of the record. But it depends very much on who we are talking about.
Arthur Brown is never truly a «serious» or a «humorous» guy; in all of his
avatars, he is primarily «whacky», and his «whackiness», almost at every point
in his career, interfered with the rest of the message — the only time he truly
succeeded in matching it to the rest of the mood and the music was on Crazy
World's epochal album. Kingdom Come
does have a sense of humor, but crazy guys going funny is not always as
humorous as it could seem — genuine humor comes from rational thinking, and
there are very few rational things about this record. Still, if your doctor
tells you that you are in the process of going ga-ga over the way the real
world is treating you, on this record you might just find the perfect soulmate
for your condition.
Check "Kingdom Come" (MP3) on Amazon
No comments:
Post a Comment