CAN: OUT OF REACH (1978)
1) Serpentine; 2) Pauper's
Daughter And I; 3) November; 4) Seven Days Awake; 5) Give Me No Roses; 6) Like
Inobe God; 7) One More Day.
Well, so much for any further extensions of
good will. The problem here is not even the total absence of Czukay — that is
more of a consequence than a cause. The problem is that Can simply lost the
magic, now confined to but a few thin strands among a sea of unfocused,
pointless confusion. As late as Flow
Motion and Saw Delight, Can were
still Can, and their grooves pulsated with that classic Can mystique, sounding
like sincerely performed religious rituals for communication with the spirits.
At first, the addition of Rosko Gee and Rebop did not hurt this mystique too
much — on the contrary, they «Africanized» the music to just the right degree.
But as their role in their band expanded, and Holger's decreased, out came the
inevitable: Can began a quick drift towards becoming just a normal jam band.
Out
Of Reach has about as much
excitement to it as a generic second-rate fusion album, even if it is not
fusion (most of the tunes are funk- and disco-based). The players get into
position and begin jamming, without bothering to come up with an emotionally
resonant theme. The result is ʽSerpentineʼ, probably the most disappointing
album opener on a Can record ever — other than the tightness (but not ferocious tightness) of the rhythm
section, there is nothing here to be recommended. The instrumental mix is
messy, with no instrument ever taking the risk of stepping into the limelight
and all keyboard and guitar solos playing at low volume, muffled and timid, so
that the track never achieves any transcendental heights. Stuff like ʽNovemberʼ
and ʽSeven Days Awakeʼ is only marginally better, with shriller, more harshly
distorted Karoli solos that still do not rise to the ecstasy of days gone by,
and essentially sound like Can on autopilot — let alone the fact that Rosko is constantly
trying to sneak a disco bassline in ʽNovemberʼ for no apparent reason other
than, well, playing what everybody else was playing at the time.
In addition to that, Rosko also steps forward
as a songwriter, contributing two vocal numbers: ʽPauper's Daughter And Iʼ is a
dull disco number, only slightly elevated by Karoli's psychedelic guitar solo,
and ʽGive Me No Rosesʼ is a surprisingly straightforward pop song with echoes
of ska — if you think it combines well with Can's acid guitar overdubs, feel
free to take it, but the way I see it, Rosko and Karoli are going against each
other's grain here, and the result is an incoherent mess where a potentially
fun pop song is messed up with a rambling arrangement, and a potentially cool
psycho jam is dissipated within an imperfect pop song.
That said, both of these tunes are God-given
masterpieces compared to ʽLike Inobe Godʼ, which is probably the worst thing
ever committed to tape under the Can moniker. The backing track sounds like a
theme for a low-budget blacksploitation movie, a fluffy soft-funk jam that goes
nowhere in particular and does nothing interesting (and totally wastes
Schmidt's talents on the piano) — and in the foreground, Rosko and Rebop add
chaotic scatting vocals that, according to one review of the album, sound like
«two rastas in the loo», a description with which I could not agree more. If
you thought Mooney was too looney, and Suzuki was too spooky, then upon hearing
ʽLike Inobe Godʼ, you will want to rush back to both as if they were Moses and
Aaron in the flesh, because this is just... ridiculous. The track has as much
to do with Can as a Mick Jagger/Lenny Kravitz collaboration has to do with The
Rolling Stones.
If not for this disaster (and it goes on for six minutes! six minutes of your time not simply wasted, but raped and
humiliated!), I might have refrained from a thumbs down — I mean, «boring»
is not quite the same as «offensive», and even the boring stuff still has those
Karoli guitar solos. But the thing is, this record really has no reason to
exist. They are not even settling into some kind of predictable-acceptable
formula — they are trying to modify the formula in such a way that it loses all
possible effectiveness. Even Saw Delight,
when you play it back to back with Tago
Mago, has its own special charm; Out
Of Reach just sounds like a band that, once upon a time, knew it all, but
ended up forgetting everything. And don't blame this on Rosko and Rebop: those guys were just doing their
Caribbean thing. It's the band's original creative management that is
ultimately responsible for this travesty.
Yeah, even the band seems to have disowned this one.
ReplyDeleteWelp, that didn't work. Here's what I was trying to link to: http://spoonrecords.com/discography/can_releases.php
DeleteYeah, this album was not reissued in any of the band's CD campaigns. You can't find it on their official discography sites and finding a copy of it is annoying.
ReplyDeleteI've often though of this as one of the worst albums I've ever heard, not just the worst Can album. If the band had focused on just going full on "ethnic" or whatever and just jammed in a concentrated and energetic way, at least it would have been fun.
This is just a sloppy and uneventful meshing of wannabe darkness and weak splotches of pop songwriting and bad "ethnic" rhythms that nobody plays with enthusiasm.
The idea of a pop song on a Can album doesn't offend me, per se, (hey, "Connection" is a pretty rocking pop song, right?) but the idea of bland pop songs does.
It's incredible to me that the band was able to sustain such a high level of interesting textures for so long, even when they were so obviously losing the "edge" that defined their early work. This album is a complete collapse of that.
Interestingly, I like the next album. Go finger.
It's not sold on the band's website for whatever reason, but Spoon Records reissued it on CD and LP on 2014 and both releases are available at Amazon, for example.
ReplyDelete"Like Inobe God" for some reason reminds me of that godawful 70s TV show The Love Boat. This track should have been a parody, but sadly I don't think that was their intention. Surely this is not the same band that brought us "Halleluhwah", "Mushroom" and "Up the Bakerloo".
ReplyDeleteCan't blame the guys for disowning "Out of Reach". Even the flawed "Saw Delight" and "Can" are somewhat enjoyable albums compared to this one.