Andrew Lloyd Webber: The Phantom Of The Opera

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER: THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (1987)

1) Prologue; 2) Overture; 3) Think Of Me; 4) Angel Of Music; 5) Little Lotte / The Mirror / Angel Of Music; 6) The Phantom Of The Opera; 7) The Music Of The Night; 8) I Remember / Stranger Than You Dreamt It; 9) Magical Las­so; 10) Notes / Prima Donna; 11) Poor Fool He Makes Me Laugh; 12) Why Have You Brought Me Here; 13) All I Ask Of You; 14) All I Ask Of You (reprise); 15) Entr'acte; 16) Masquerade / Why So Silent; 17) Notes... / Twisted Every Way...; 18) Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again; 19) Wandering Child... / Bravo, Monsieur; 20) The Point Of No Return; 21) Down Once More... / Track Down This Murderer.

Somewhere in the syrupy depths of ʽMusic Of The Nightʼ, there is something sung about how «silently the senses abandon their defenses», which is probably the cleverest line in the entire musical — this is exactly the effect that Sir Andrew was going for here, and I must say, it works. Perhaps my defenses are not as solid as those of the modern day Spartans who eat Henry Cow for breakfast, but why deal in extremes all the time?..

The Phantom Of The Opera was totally huge in its time and still remains one of the epitomes of hugeness. This alone would be sure to generate a big ball of hatred, but there's worse: it is also the epitome of kitsch, a sprawling, «tasteless» simplification of classical music values. In a way, it is the direct predecessor to these sorts of things — from Titanic to Harry Potter — that produce extremely mixed reactions in people: on one hand, they are not overtly «bad» (professional, care­fully crafted, stimulating, exciting, etc.), on the other hand... oh, well. They also divide people like few other things can — provoking either fanatical adoration, or deep hatred; the latter can very easily spread from the «piece of art» onto the people who adore it, so be careful.

First, let us let out some demons. The story behind Phantom, no matter how already textbook-ish before Lloyd Webber decided to tackle it, is silly and fluffy. Gaston Leroux, who wrote the origi­nal novel, was no Edgar Poe and not even a Bram Stoker (actually, it only takes a quick browse through the titles of his numerous novels to realize that). It is, in fact, the silliest and fluffiest sub­ject picked up by Sir Andrew up to that point — at least neither Cats nor Starlight Express pre­tended to adult-oriented seriousness, but Phantom does, and this is reflected in the arrangements, requiring a fully formed symphonic orchestra (which eventually had to be somewhat cut down from the original design for touring purposes).

Nor is the production free from the usual shortcomings of post-JC Lloyd Webber: big, clumsy hooks, simplistically adapted from the composer's musical experience, repeating themselves over and over again until one becomes unsure of the exact reason they stick in one's head — is it be­cause they're so good, or just because you have heard them so many times already? Again, the man was accused of stealing from Puccini (ʽMusic Of The Nightʼ), and, more famously, from Pink Floyd: Roger Waters explicitly stated that Sir Andrew had expropriated one of the sub-me­lodies of ʽEchoesʼ for the main «Introducing The Phantom» theme of the musical. But why didn't he sue? "Life's too short to sue Andrew fuckin' Lloyd Webber", he is supposed to have said, while writing up the subpoenas for his own former band mates. Yet I have a sneaky suspicion that he might have really been afraid of Andrew fuckin' Lloyd Webber choosing a line of defence in which he would scoop up a half-dozen earlier musical scores which would all involve the same melody — it is, after all, a rather trivial chromatic run that anyone can incidentally or deliberately run across. You don't really have to be Andrew fuckin' Lloyd Webber to write the spooky «da-da-da-da-DAAA, do-do-do-do-DOO» bit in Phantom Of The Opera and make it one of the most instantly recognizable phrases of the century. Or, wait a moment — maybe you do.

If, on Starlight Express, the composer's point was to make a head-spinning mish-mash of all the possible «pop» styles, his task on Phantom was more complex — to make a similar mish-mash out of the different varieties of both «academic» and «pop-oriented» classical music. Hence, there is a little bit of everything here. Church organ with baroque flourishes; Viennese court music; light-headed, free-perching Mozartian opera themes; Neapolitan heart-on-the-sleeve pathos; and, of course, plenty of attempts at reincarnating the spirits of Gilbert & Sullivan. No Alban Berg influences, though, for reasons that are easy to understand.

Predictably, the result is a classical music lover's nightmare, but a paradise for supporters of healthy, wholesale «family entertainment». The «scary» elements of the story are reduced to a sparse minimum (so there's a chandelier crashing down and a guy with a partially disfigured face, big deal for an epoch in which Nightmare On Elm Street was already a couple years old), with the romantic parts occupying like 60% of the story and the «comical» parts taking care of most of the rest. Phantom Of The Opera is, indeed, the last step in the gradual transformation of Lloyd We­bber from an ambitious musical rebel that used to have his own point of view on meaningful is­sues — into a calculated commercial hack thriving on the superficial.

But as long as we accept that, Phantom Of The Opera is, unquestionably, the master of its own domain. I mean, we can all live with a simple fairy tale, and this one has its own unique appeal. Even the singers sound like they come straight out of a fairy tale, particularly Sarah Brightman, with her voice of such otherworldly transparent clarity, it seems like they polished it with glass-dust for several years before letting her out to sing. (She does not have too much appeal beyond that clarity, but she is well chosen anyway, for a role that demands the character to be a living china doll and little else.) So is Michael Crawford in the title role, playing it so naturally as if he'd come straight off from playing heartbroken Disney villains for decades.

The thing is, there are some «cheap thrills» out there that do not work, and there are some that do. Lloyd Webber may have lost his credibility as a «serious» artist (although he himself would pro­bably deny the existence of the huge gap that lies between JCS and Phantom), but I would be lying through my teeth if I denied the effectiveness of these hooks — the scary ones, the comic ones, the romantic ones. The Phantom-introducing theme may be trivial, or it may be stolen, but it still triggers a little heart-jump every time it appears out of nowhere. The title track, «decora­ted» with a steady electronic beat to give it extra hit-single power, has an unforgettable Gothic glow (which made it into a favorite for various aspiring poppy-Goth-and/or-art-metal bands). ʽMusic Of The Nightʼ and ʽPoint Of No Returnʼ are beauty-and-the-beast romance done as fine as the genre is capable of doing. The vaudevillian interludes during which the theater staff is reciting the Phantom's letters are genuinely funny (including the words of the letters themselves). And the idea of contrasting the «mannered», «wooden» way in which Carlotta begins to sing ʽThink Of Meʼ with Christine Sarah Brightman's fragility-itself performance is, as much as I hate to admit it, a touch of musical genius.

The unavoidable consequence of all this is, as we get to the finale and a devastated Phantom Of The Michael Crawford belting out "it's over now, the music of the night", the evil Sir Andrew will have succeeded where his character has not: make many a listener, including even some ja­ded ones, swoon under his spell, and maybe even shed a tear or two for the poor Phantom. On a purely intellectual basis, the musical deserves, at best, a condescending attitude, at worst, total de­spisal. But on a gut level, I have even known a couple of genuine classical music aficionados who confessed to having enjoyed Phantom, even as they were well aware of its utter fluffiness. And even from a purely reason-based standpoint, there is probably no better way to integrate the old school of opera, the newer school of operetta, and the modern school of Broadway musical toge­ther than the way it has been done by Webber. As for all the corn syrup... well, frankly speaking, there are quite a few remarks here that could be addressed at «serious» Italian opera itself.

Phantom Of The Opera is a landmark that certainly needs to be heard, preferably in the original London cast version (the show shared the usual A.Ll.W. curse of cheapening up with time, and, by all means, nobody really needs to see the Joel Schumacher movie). I doubt that it could ever function as a proper introduction into the «wonderful world of classical music» for «the people», no more so than Harry Potter could ever function as a useful tool for «introducing the young rea­der to the habit of reading books» (practice showing that it only served as a useful tool for intro­ducing them to the habit of reading Harry Potter-type books). But it may serve as one of those bridges on which certain types of people, usually keeping far away from each other, may be ready to meet and discuss things together. Except the «cheap funny fluff» of one listener will be the «amazing, breathtaking musical journey» of another.

My compromise will look as follows: I give Phantom Of The Opera an unflinching thumbs up — and with this, make it my last review of an Andrew Lloyd Webber production. From the bits and pieces I have heard or read about, his subsequent immersion into the world of «show tunes», which I normally stay away from simply through lack of interest, was complete, yet none of his subsequent productions replicated even a tiny part of the brouhaha caused by Phantom. There may be occasional patches of populist greatness left in there, but it just makes no sense reviewing that kind of music instead of, say, Westside Story. On the other hand, the musical journey that began with Joseph and Jesus reaches quite a natural ending here — a thrilling journey, in itself, one that perhaps deserves being turned into its own musical (on the malicious effects of commer­cial success, entitled Phantom Of The Superstar). And who would be the composer and the lib­rettist? That one's easy — Roger Waters, of course!

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Beatles: Beatles For Sale

BEATLES: BEATLES FOR SALE (1964)

1) No Reply; 2) I'm A Loser; 3) Baby's In Black; 4) Rock And Roll Music; 5) I'll Follow The Sun; 6) Mr. Moonlight; 7) Kansas City/Hey Hey Hey Hey; 8) Eight Days A Week; 9) Words Of Love; 10) Honey Don't; 11) Every Little Thing; 12) I Don't Want To Spoil The Party; 13) What You're Doing; 14) Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby.

Tradition dictates that Beatles For Sale should always be docked half a point, one star, or the + sign next to A Hard Day's Night, its luckier elder brother from the same year. It is one of the few Beatles albums that makes no giant steps forwards; it is objectively the only Beatles album that makes one small step backwards by re-introducing the six obligatory cover tunes, where the previous record had seemed to so effectively obliterate this custom; and the four lads are standing in a clearly «autumnal» mood on the front cover, all of them «babies in black», worn and torn by heavy touring, annoying socializing, and life-sucking demands from the music industry.

It is true enough that the boys were getting tired, particularly of having too many other people make the decisions for them, and it does seem to be true that they simply did not have the time to come up with enough original material to fill a complete LP. It is unquestionably true that, on the whole, the sound of Beatles For Sale is less «happy» than that of Hard Day's Night — the al­bum does, after all, begin with three «downers», and John is no longer contributing teenage odes to joy à la ʽI Should Have Known Betterʼ.

And, speaking of the covers, I still share the opinion that ʽMr. Moonlightʼ is one of the unluckiest choices the band ever made. The Dr. Feelgood version, which they copied with very little imagi­nation, had it registered as a soul ballad with an almost crooner-ish atmosphere, quite incompa­tible with John's usual singing voice; and where his frenzied screaming worked so well on ʽAnnaʼ because the song had a tragic heart, it feels silly and wasted on the bridge sections of this parti­cular tune. The only clever touch was to replace the original rudimentary guitar solo with an eerie Hammond organ passage — but no Beatles song in which the instrumental, rather than vocal, part is the best one can really count as successful.

However, apart from that minor misstep, Beatles For Sale is anything but a «step backwards» in the story of the Beatles' development. Any detailed song-by-song analysis would immediately show just how many of these itty-bitty-beatly «trifles» make a first appearance here — whenever these guys were locked in the studio with George the Fifth at the helm, tired or not tired, they just weren't interested in repeating the same old formulae. «Beatle-quality» had to mean «creative», even if it meant being «creative» on an old piece of Carl Perkins boogie.

So, just a few things off the top of my head. Buddy Holly wrote ʽWords Of Loveʼ in 1957, and he must have been so proud to have come up with that melody that he did not bother giving it all the studio care it required. Play the original and the cover back to back, and the first thing you notice is how much «juicier» the main guitar line is sounding. Where Buddy is satisfied with just occa­sionally letting out that high-pitched piercing tone, George uses it on every note, getting a warm, jangly effect — tender and cordial, but without a trace of cheap sentimentality. With John out there behind him, partially doubling his work on a second, barely audible guitar, the effect is otherworldly, and even though the solo break, faithfully following Holly's original, is no more than two different phrases played over and over again, I would not mind a longer version.

Laying on echo effects was one of the band's favorite tricks ever since With The Beatles at least, but it was a cool touch when they threw them on 'Rock And Roll Music' and 'Everybody's Trying To Be My Baby', giving the old rock'n'roll chestnuts an «arena» feel instead of the «chamber» feel of the originals. In fact, the feel of 'Rock And Roll Music' has completely shifted: Chuck did this song just like he did all the rest — with a friendly smile, inviting all the young ladies and gentlemen out there to try out this brand new hot dance called rock and roll. This rendition de­mands that you scream your head off, instead of dancing your legs off: because of the echo ef­fects, John's brawny delivery, and Paul's somber bass, it is far more aggressive than Chuck ever intended it to be. Ditto with Carl Perkins, when they start laying the echo on Harrison's vocals (but they couldn't do anything of the kind with ʽHoney Don'tʼ, so they just... gave it to Ringo. Who did a hilarious job with it, anyway).

Now, about the originals. First, we are all taught that it is here, and nowhere else, that John star­ted to fall under the Dylan spell, and take a healthier attitude towards the lyrics — hence, ʽI'm A Loserʼ, a feeble first attempt to climb out of the mire of clichés. The famous "Although I laugh and I act like a clown / Beneath this mask I am fearing a frown" would hardly count as «signifi­cant lyrics» today, but for the Beatles in 1964, it was a milestone. It is debatable if we can take ʽI'm A Loserʼas the beginning of John's «no-bullshit-allowed» phase, where everything had to be either strictly tongue-in-cheek or strictly heart-on-the-sleeve, but, in any case, there is increased «character complexity» here, and that be good.

Second, McCartney is quickly learning how to put «genius» and «corn» in the same package, co­ming up with his first genuinely great «softie». Curiously, ʽI'll Follow The Sunʼ is usually said to have been written around 1960, which might explain the man's dragging it out of the storeroom for lack of time to write something new; but maybe it is a good thing that it was given four years of fermentation. Now it sounds a bit Searchers-style, what with the folksy melody and the harmo­nic layering and all, but more homely and sincere, due to the production and the clever alternation between group singing and Paul's solo lines. Just a year and a half separating this from the thema­tically similar ʽP.S. I Love Youʼ, but that song screamed NAÏVE all over the place, and this one spells WISENED — big reason why Paul still performs ʽI'll Follow The Sunʼ in concert, on occa­sion, but never the other one (not that anyone would mind, I suppose).

Third, shortly after discovering feedback on the single ʽI Feel Fineʼ, they discover the fade-in — on ʽEight Days A Weekʼ. Much of the band's experimentation was done «randomly», «just for fun», etc., but one big difference of the Beatles' approach to experimentation is that they rarely kept their experimental results if they weren't sure that they had come out somewhat meaningful and were appropriate for the song in question. So, before we go «A fade-in on ʽEight Days A We­ekʼ? Big deal! Who the heck cares?», let us listen to the fade-in and, perhaps, understand that it works here as the equivalent of a crescendo, which the band had no special means of producing at that time (they'd need an orchestra at least). ʽEight Days A Weekʼ is another one of those ode-to-joy songs, cruder and simpler than ʽI Should Have Known Betterʼ, and never one of my favorites in that genre (for one thing, too repetitive — a solo break couldn't have hurt, and the "hold me, love me, hold me, love me" refrain also seems too roughly hewn), but the fade-in suits it perfect­ly — it is the first ten seconds of the song, from the first faraway notes to the breakout of "ooh I need your love babe..." that do it for me.

Fourth, the Beatles discover the value of... silence. While the more famous songs of Side B have always been ʽEight Days A Weekʼ and ʽEvery Little Thingʼ, I have always held a soft spot for ʽWhat You're Doingʼ, because of the important role with which they entrusted Ringo — hold the melody for the first few bars on his little old drummer's own, before introducing the looped elec­tric riff (very similar in texture, by the way, to the one that would soon make the Byrds famous with ʽMr. Tambourine Manʼ). Then, once the song is done, they repeat the same trick once again before fading out — as if saying, «hey, it was quite cool in the beginning, surely you want us to do it one more time? heavier on the bass this time, right?»... and it works.

So, in the end, it's just the little things that make Beatles For Sale as essential a Beatles album in your catalog as everything that surrounds it. It takes its cue from the second half of Hard Day's Night, not the first one, and overcomes it in terms of diversity, jangliness, and, in a way, «dark­ness». Artistically, it is still dominated by John, which is a good thing, because Paul as a «domi­nator» would only be acceptable once the band entered its wild-experimental-frenzy phase; but overall, it is still very much a group effort, and, ultimately, another success, if not necessarily ano­ther «triumph». Predictable thumbs up here.

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Blind Blake: Complete Recorded Works Vol. 4 (1929-1932)

BLIND BLAKE: COMPLETE RECORDED WORKS, VOL. 4 (1929-1932)

1) Sweet Jivin' Mama; 2) Lonesome Christmas Blues; 3) Third Degree Blues; 4) Guitar Chimes; 5) Blind Arthur's Breakdown; 6) Baby Lou Blues; 7) Cold Love Blues; 8) Papa Charlie Jackson And Blind Blake Talk About It, pt. 1; 9) Papa Charlie Jackson And Blind Blake Talk About It, pt. 2; 10) Stingaree Man Blues; 11) Itching Heel; 12) You've Got What I Want; 13) Cherry Hill Blues; 14) Diddie Wah Diddie No. 2; 15) Hard Pushing Papa; 16) What A Low Down Place The Jailhouse Is; 17) Ain't Gonna Do That No More; 18) Playing Policy Blues; 19) Righteous Blues; 20) Rope Stretching Blues, pt. 2; 21) Rope Stretching Blues, pt. 1; 22) Champagne Charlie Is My Name; 23) Depression's Gone From Me Blues.

The last volume in the series is, unfortunately, quite far from great — not an atypical situation for the old bluesmen, decimated by life on the road, heavy drinking, and Depression depression no less harder than the rock generation youngsters would be decimated by their problems. Two ex­cellent pre-Depression sides may be found early on: ʽGuitar Chimesʼ, a slow blues shuffle that does indeed begin with some nifty «chiming», and the faster ragtime guitar showcase ʽBlind Arthur's Breakdownʼ — probably the last time you can hear the man relatively unburdened with atrocious hiss and crackle, doing his fabulously inimitable stuff.

The two-part «dialog» between Blake and Papa Charlie Jackson on the banjo, done in the form of a traveling minstrel show, is an excellent historical document, but the awful sound quality makes it all but impossible to understand the dialog as such, and they do concentrate on verbal exchange quite a bit more than on instrumental exchange. Then there are several more numbers on which Blake backs Irene Scruggs (tracks 10-13) — her vocals are a bit more distinctive and playful than those of the man's previous female partners, but the only well-audible highlight is ʽItching Heelʼ, where Blake plays it slow and cautious, but occasionally breaks into ragtime frenzy, changing the mood from passive-aggressive to comical.

By 1930, Blind Blake predictably had his studio time cut severely — and, according to most ac­counts, packed it with extra drinking instead, so that most of these late-period recordings were hardly up to the standards set in earlier years. The two-part ʽRope Stretchin' Bluesʼ is among his grimmest offerings, sung and played with tragic intonations that seem more heartfelt than ever be­fore (hard times taking their toll?). ʽChampagne Charlie Is My Nameʼ is an old Victorian music hall number that is so different in mood and style from Blake's usual repertoire that people have even expressed doubts about whether it is Blind Blake at all — one of those little mysteries that drives obsessive people crazy. No reason, though, why Blind Blake shouldn't have tried to make a different recording, especially considering that his standard blues repertoire was selling poorly. He could have been experimenting with his image a bit, deliberately choosing something upbeat and «jolly» to cheer people up — no wonder that the last track on here, a cover of the well-known standart ʽSittin' On Top Of The Worldʼ, is re-titled ʽDepression's Gone From Me Bluesʼ.

Depression would really be gone from Blind Blake several years later, when, unemployed and penniless, he would die from pulmonary tuberculosis (according to a recently discovered death certificate for one Arthur Blake in Milwaukee, provided, of course, that there is no coincidence involved). Had he lived, he would, of course, be eventually rediscovered and dragged out by an Alan Lomax, but, as it is, all we have left is just one photo, cleverly spread in four different di­mensions on four different album sleeves for the Document series — gradually zooming away from us as the years roll by. Technically, this last volume is the weakest of the lot and, according­ly, gets a thumbs down, but if you are hunting for the whole package rather than a best-of, there is no sense in bypassing it: with just four CDs worth of material from one of the era's most re­nowned and innovative guitar players, who'd want to intentionally ignore even his twilight years?

Blitzen Trapper: Furr

BLITZEN TRAPPER: FURR (2008)

1) Sleepytime In The Western World; 2) Gold For Bread; 3) Furr; 4) God & Suicide; 5) Fire & Fast Bullets; 6) Sa­turday Nite; 7) Black River Killer; 8) Not Your Lover; 9) Love U; 10) War On Machines; 11) Stolen Shoes & A Ri­fle; 12) Echo / Always On / EZ Con; 13) Lady On The Water.

Big critical success here, but I am not all that impressed. Too rootsy! Not enough rock'n'roll! With the exception of one or two big-scale numbers, Furr is almost yer average camping album — and I am sure that few people are more qualified to write wildlife camping albums than a bunch of gifted sons of authentic Oregon trappers, but there is not enough inventiveness running through their veins to turn Furr into the next John Wesley Harding, or into one of those classic John Prine or Willie Nelson albums.

The title track is suitably «nice», but does not really do justice to Eric Earley's songwriting talents: just a basic country-pop acoustic shuffle with a derivative vocal melody. His warm vocal tone is always welcome, and the metaphorically Mowgli-like story in the lyrics is original enough, but truly and verily, many people sing these kinds of stories, few are capable of making them stick. Writing and recording a song like ʽFurrʼ, to me, seems a bit like winning in a local songwriting contest — the basic requirements are met, the clichés successfully worked around without losing an atmosphere of authenticity, the resulting grade is A+, and now off you go to continue with your dayjob at the local sheet metal factory.

That Blitzen Trapper are capable of more than just «making the grade» is clearly seen from the other single, ʽBlack River Killerʼ. Technically, it is just another acoustic folk tune, with a darker overtone this time, as the title already suggests, but this time, with a poppier hook in the chorus, and a moody «theremin-synth» line in between the verses to spice up the atmosphere. Of course, it is always easier to write a «sticky» dark song than a happy one (most of us are easier drawn to gruesome tales of serial killers than to simple stories of settling down to raise a family), but the darkness itself does not account for the special catchiness of the chorus or that particularly glo­omy synthesizer flourish.

Unfortunately, such flourishes are rare on Furr. With a pretty piano ballad like ʽNot Your Loverʼ, you could hope for at least a small bit of musical development throughout the album, yet there is none, and I am not just going to fall over for lines like "Cause I'm a moonwalkin' cowboy, dusty ridin' / And I don't know what's in store" if they are simply accompanied with a pretty (but whiny) voice and one finger on a piano. Lazy! Get out of bed!

Yes, there are a few upbeat pop tunes here, fattened with wailing electric guitar and other ingredi­ents, but after the opening successful punch of ʽSleepytime In The Western Worldʼ, with its organ leads and amateurishly eccentric guitar pyrotechnics, something like ʽSaturday Niteʼ, very similar in terms of upbeat-ness, is already nowhere near impressive. Nor is ʽWar On Machinesʼ, where they take the same stomp and change the time signature just a bit, to let in some barroom-rock atmosphere. But it's the same multitracked acoustic guitars all over again. ʽLove Uʼ, a slowly crawling «screamfest», is certainly different — but not very good, as far as I am concerned. (Eric is not a professional screamer at all).

So, if Blitzen Trapper in general are a good band, very occasionally being put through to a stra­ight line with God, Furr is the album that shows all of their limitations. Earley's strength is in his diversity: no matter if each individual song is not Beatle-quality, there are so many of them done in so many different ways that the cumulative effect is disarming the critic. Furr, on the other hand, is an attempt at creating something semi-conceptual, a 21st century look at the rudiments of two hundred years' time, and its tighter focus is at the same time its Achilles' heel. I have nothing against these guys employing roots-rock elements in their music — but I never asked them to go ahead and «reinvent» roots-rock as such for me. If I want rootsy, I just go and put me on some Robbie Robertson. A disappointing thumbs down here — which should not prevent neither you nor myself from easily enjoying ʽBlack River Killerʼ.

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Archers Of Loaf: White Trash Heroes

ARCHERS OF LOAF: WHITE TRASH HEROES (1998)

1) Fashion Bleeds; 2) Dead Red Eyes; 3) I.N.S.; 4) Perfect Time; 5) Slick Tricks And Bright Lights; 6) One Slight Wrong Move; 7) Banging On A Dead Drum; 8) Smokers In Love; 9) After The Last Laugh; 10) White Trash Heroes.

Reportedly, the Archers Of Loaf found themselves artistically blocked after touring in support of Airports, and I easily believe that — I mean, who wouldn't, after having to play songs from the dullest record of one's career over and over again? Eventually, it was decided that, if the band were to go on, it would have to change. The heavy fate of the Artist who did not, from the out­set, list «stability of sound» as one of the major goals in his career: either you change, or you lose the right to that capital A, not to mention an A+ in Robert Christgau’s next blurb.

The exact change from Airports to White Trash Heroes is not easy to describe, though. Every­one acknowledges it, and the band actually lost some of the fan support because of it, but nobody can really summarize it in one or two sentences. It's not as if they brought in a host of guest mu­sicians or a symphonic orchestra, started writing twenty-minute long suites, or covering Frank Sinatra on authentic XVIIth century instruments. Individually, many of the songs are not that dif­ferent from the classic Archers sound. But altogether, White Trash Heroes definitely constitutes one of their finest offerings, and I'd probably rate it second in my personal ranking for today.

What do you do when you understand your own mediocrity as a God-sent troubadour, yet cannot resist the temptation of making, in the simple hope that you’ll maybe get lucky next time? Easy — you turn upon yourself in all your wretched mediocrity, and intensify the only thing you're sure of. (I realize I have by now offended every devoted Archers fan on the planet, but, as a fair­ly mediocre writer myself, I somehow feel a bond between myself and the band, to be honored by admitting it). Who are the «White Trash Heroes»? Take a wild guess.

The seven-minute long title track is structured as a long, repetitive, part-time Bob Dylan, part-time Lou Reed visionary epic, pinned to the simplest of hooks for heavier effect. It drags on slowly and drearily, on the wings of a simple synth line and a sea of anthemic feedback, until the voice finally fades out and all that is left is the murky electric guitar pushing the theme forward for an extra two minutes. It is the most perfect conclusion to the Archers' career that could ever be desired: a song that declares the ugliness of it all through a long series of half-baked, hu­mor­less poetic metaphors, being ugly as hell, but somewhat mesmerizing, in itself.

Even before you get to it, though, you have to endure a sea of industrial bleakness. ʽFashion Bleedsʼ would be just another grungy slab of grunge, if not for the annoying, ear-piercing electro­nic bleep sub-melody that eventually generates itself out of the muck, claiming your attention so that it can tamper with your digestion system. On ʽDead Red Eyesʼ, all singing is done in a whiny, high-pitched manner, reminiscent of Neil Young and his endless complaints about life's miseries. On ʽPerfect Timeʼ, the lead guitar line is set to «dirge mode» almost continuously — now we can finally understand the fans, who were waiting for some punch-the-wall attitude and got some lie-down-and-die attitude instead. ʽOne Slight Wrong Moveʼ justifies the «industrial» tag explicitly: it starts off with factory-style banging and clanging, and culminates in the electronically encoded refrain ("a hundred million could be wrong") that, again, could serve as an irritant in the eyes of all the admirers of Archers as a «live» band, but is actually well in line with the overall moods and temperatures on the record.

In the middle of it all, it is easy to lose trace of ʽSmokers In Loveʼ, a brief instrumental track that should actually be counted among their finest creations — a bit of melodic «art-grunge» which shows excellent teamwork and expression. Your best chance of remembering it is probably thro­ugh the fat distorted opening riff, but the guitar- and even basswork on the main section are noti­ceable as well. By now, the Archers can not only «weave» their trademark double/triple-guitar patterns, they can do this with a stern, robotic air (must have been listening to lots of Krautrock), making the same kind of progress here that one usually sees in the evolution from «punk» to «post-punk». It's not entirely new, but with these guys, it works.

Overall, White Trash Heroes could really signify a transition to something more... purposeful, I guess, than the early Archers albums. It is that close to turning Bachmann into one of those «ge­neration spokesmen» — with all the debt that the title track owes to previous generation spokes­men, it belongs in the 1990s, a decade that did not really have its own Bob Dylan or Neil Young or Lou Reed, except for the original old ones. But maybe it was exactly this «looking back» thing that did not work out, I don't know. In any case, even if White Trash Heroes was an artistic dead end — and the band did not survive it — it still remains a curious and touching artistic dead end to revisit, and the title track is as good a «self-destructive goodbye note» as any. Thumbs up.

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Asia: Omega

ASIA: OMEGA (2010)

1) Finger On The Trigger; 2) Through My Veins; 3) Holy War; 4) Ever Yours; 5) Listen Children; 6) End Of The World; 7) Light The Way; 8) Emily; 9) Still The Same; 10) There Was A Time; 11) I Believe; 12) Don't Wanna Lose You Now.

This would have sure made for a great title to the band's swan-song album (and makes me envisi­on the prospect of a supercool band whose very first album would be titled Alpha, with the sub­sequent catalog running through all the letters of the Greek alphabet — a priceless idea, and here I am giving it away for free). Unfortunately, no sooner had it come out that they disappointed everyone with predictably dull statements — «we thought it was just a nice word to use, it doesn't really mean anything» or something to that effect. What a turn-off.

It's not as if listening to Omega would make me want to scream «just retire already!». It's hardly worse than Phoenix, and in some respects, maybe better. There are no longer any conscious at­tempts to revive any «authentic prog vibe» — an impossible task for a band that never had any to begin with. All of the songs are strictly within the four-to-five minute range, and all are pinned to recurrent pop hooks, with no far-fetched ideas of massive sonic exploration or whatever, although Steve Howe is still given plenty of opportunities to shine, and his presence graces the album even more now that they are no longer willing to remind us «we are the sidekicks of Yes, we are the sidekicks of Yes» every several minutes.

As a result, all of this is mostly decent, well-produced, multi-layered music – never terribly exci­ting, but memorable enough to keep the head occupied and restrained enough to keep the senses un-annoyed. Occasionally, they still tend to let Geoff in the front with the big old «heavenly key­board» sound, with Wetton belting out a standing-on-the-cliff-waving-his-hair-in-the-wind power ballad against it (ʽEver Yoursʼ), but most of these tracks could be played as background music without any major embarrassment.

ʽFinger On The Triggerʼ may not have been the best of all possible openings, though. They intro­duce it with one of those old-school «pop-metal» riffs, as if to convince us that they still have that «kick-ass crunch», but if they didn't really have it then, why would I start believing that they have it now? It's not an awful pop-rocker — the chorus is catchy, and Steve eventually breaks away from the lumbering rhythm-work and into the realm of high-pitched melodic solos. But already the second track, ʽThrough My Veinsʼ, on which they slow down the tempo and turn the mood to «rhythmically meditative», sounds more effective, even if, technically, it is more «boring». May­be it is because, at this point, Wetton's vocals just do not work on rock-out-oriented material: he does fine enough on the «wisened old man» front.

From then on, it's all fairly even – some love ballads, some social statements, some end-of-the-world predictions (even a song called ʽEnd Of The Worldʼ in case you don't feel it), but nothing ever stands out. With tremendous mental effort, I am only able to single out ʽEmilyʼ as a relative high point, exclusively due to Steve's fabulous slide work which raises this mid-tempo piano pop ballad out of adult contemporary mediocrity and adds a slight ʽAnd You And Iʼ-like shade — al­ways welcome. Eventually they wave us goodbye on ʽDon't Wanna Lose You Nowʼ, which wi­sely reproduces the life-is-great optimistic conclusion of Phoenix — a fairly effective conclusion, considering that only a couple of songs before they did little but complain about the various evils and injustices of the world. But never worry — it's all gonna be okay, as long as these guys are to­gether to serve as our guiding lights. A world without Asia is, after all, a much more lonely place than a world without Europe, don't you agree?

(I mean the bands, naturally, not the continents).

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Average White Band: Cupid's In Fashion

AVERAGE WHITE BAND: CUPID'S IN FASHION (1982)

1) You're My Number One; 2) Easier Said Than Done; 3) You Wanna Belong; 4) Cupid's In Fashion; 5) Theatre Of Excess; 6) I Believe; 7) Is It Love That You're Running From; 8) Reach Out I'll Be There; 9) Isn't It Strange; 10) Love's A Heartache.

I will try to be brief. An album titled Cupid's In Fashion cannot be a great album – period. An album titled Cupid's In Fashion and featuring six white-clad guys on the album cover cannot even be a good album. And an album titled Cupid's In Fashion, featuring six white-clad guys on the album, and coming from a band that went from playing their instruments to manipulating them, is zooming straight ahead into the realm of total darkness.

The only comforting thing I can say about Cupid is that, even in 1982, the band was holding out against going electronic, and, apart from some occasional robotic tampering with the drums, most of the music was still built around funky guitar playing, brass riffs, and gentle keyboard patterns. But this time around, there is not even an ʽInto The Nightʼ in sight — everything is either pedes­trian dance muzak or mushy, instantly forgettable balladry.

ʽReach Out I'll Be Thereʼ is the obvious standout, of course, since great Motown hits of the past have very little competition when they are surrounded by flat hackwork; but, predictably, the band adds nothing to the original, yet detracts quite a lot — and this is probably the first time I really feel the urge to strangle Gorrie for his falsetto.

Other than that, the title track is the only one that even attempts to build up a hookline, but it is a shallow and cold hookline, and marred with awful lyrics to boot. This whole musical schtick was hopelessly dated by 1982 — on-the-edge dance music was evolving in the direction of Contro­versy and Thriller, which these guys were unable to follow, being completely stuck in the reser­ved, «uptight» state of the 1970s. An obvious thumbs down — the only sensible thing they could have done at that time was to break up, and, fortunately, that is exactly what they did, once it be­came clear that Cupid, apparently, was not nearly as much in fashion as advertised. Especially when the Cupid that you are advertising looks suspiciously like a rubber doll.

Andrew Lloyd Webber: Starlight Express

ANDREW LLOYD WEBBER: STARLIGHT EXPRESS (1984)

1) Overture; 2) Rolling Stock; 3) Call Me Rusty; 4) A Lotta Locomotion; 5) Pumping Iron; 6) Freight; 7) AC/DC; 8) He Whistled At Me; 9) The Race; 10) There's Me; 11) Poppa's Blues; 12) Belle The Sleeping Car; 13) Starlight Ex­press; 14) The Rap; 15) U.N.C.O.U.P.L.E.D.; 16) Rolling Stock (reprise); 17) CB; 18) Right Place, Right Time; 19) I Am The Starlight; 20) He Whistled At Me (reprise); 21) Race: The Final; 22) No Come Back; 23) One Rock & Roll Too Many; 24) Only He; 25) Only You; 26) Light At The End Of The Tunnel.

I have never read a single book of the Rev W. Awdry's Railway Series, so I do not have the faint­est idea if Rev Ll. Webber's musical interpretation of these oeuvres matches the vision of their li­terary creator. I am pretty sure, though, that the Railway Series did not as thoroughly explore all of the clichés of popular literary genres as Starlight Express does it with popular music — and, therefore, deduce that, for Lloyd Webber, the cutesy stories about anthropomorphic trains were mostly just an excuse to write something lite — for the «young adult» or whatever that species is called — and indulge in a bunch of simplistic pleasures.

Simplistic, but genuinely fun. Like Tell Me On A Sunday, Starlight Express sort of got lost in between the hugeness of Cats and Phantom Of The Opera, but it is exactly because of its rela­tive lack of ambition that I can easily see how the talking trains could be more sympathetic than the talking cats or the talking ghosts. However, there are two things one has to accept before pro­ceeding: (1) the storyline, the train characters, and their life problems sound very silly, so if you cannot stand silly, get outta here; (2) the music is as derivative as it comes — derived from all over the place, but with barely a finger lifted to write a strikingly original melody. (Oh, and the actors are all supposed to be roller-skating throughout the show, but, fortunately, the original cast recording has no whirring on it, so I suppose the singers were skate-free in the studio.)

This strange bout of «laziness» resulted in the album having no big hit single, no ʽMemoryʼ to flood the airwaves, but that is hardly a reason to complain: despite the overwhelming diversity of styles, Starlight Express is sternly coherent, and does not really need a big cathartic statement. It's just one for the kids, really, and it works well from that point of view. The real downside is that, having temporarily re-oriented himself on the pop/rock idiom, Sir Andrew also got entang­l­ed in 1980s production — replete with generic synthesizers, big bashing drums, programmed rhythm tracks, the works. It does not occur on all of the tracks, but about 70% are contaminated, and you have to bear with this, too, or hunt for newer versions of the musical (which I would not recommend: given the fact that Lloyd Webber's sense of taste seems to have been worsening ex­ponentially with each new decade, I can only hope that his heirs will return him the honors that he seems to be unable to bestow upon himself in person).

Anyway, lower your expectations, grab the popcorn, and Starlight Express is really a delight­ful little ride. As I said, the story is nothing to write home about: there is, naturally, a love element, an array of various «train personalities» in a mish-mash technically (but not musically) similar to the character array of Cats, and a shaky subject line concerning a train race, which Andrew re­gards as a good pretext to stuff disco elements into the pot — because, naturally, what other sort of music would better correspond to a train race? (Thrash metal, perhaps, but something tells me Sir Andrew was not a big fan of Show No Mercy at the time... yet).

The songs are harmless fun, though, particularly when they emulate older genres. ʽRolling Stockʼ sounds like bulgy disco-era ELO (à la ʽDon't Let Me Downʼ), with an extra touch of classic glam. ʽA Lotta Locomotionʼ is girl-pop with a Caribbean flavor (and a bit of pre-pubescent Michael Jack­sonism?). ʽPumping Ironʼ is pedestrian, but startlingly arrogant boogie; ʽPoppa's Bluesʼ wise­ly imitates pub-style, drunken blues-rock rather than «reverential» blues-rock; the vaudeville of ʽBelle The Sleeping Carʼ goes down easy due to P. P. Arnold's powerhouse vocal performance (best on the whole album, I'd say); and by the time we get to the closing fast-tempo gospel finale of ʽLight At The End Of The Tunnelʼ, many more of these short genre-honoring nuggets will make their appearance, way too many to waste time on their descriptions.

Every now and then, of course, the composer delves into the «now», usually with abysmal results because such words as «underground» or «non-commercial» are not in Andrew Lloyd Webber's lingo: his idea of keeping up with the times is best exemplified on ʽThe Rapʼ, which is more or less what it says it is and wastes five minutes of my time on having to listen to a bunch of trains arguing between each other in a «rap» fashion. There are also a few numbers like ʽAC/DCʼ that tend to drift way too far into the synth-pop realm, and seeing Lloyd Webber work in a Depeche Mode state of mind is not the happiest of choices. On the other hand, ʽThe Raceʼ, which takes all the individual train themes and sets them to disco beats, is seductively cheesy in much the same way as the disco «experiments» on Saturday Night Fever — there is something deeply embar­rassing about the experience, but it carries about a sense of silly happy giddiness that hooks you in regardless of, or maybe due to the silliness.

Derivative, but at times insanely catchy; silly, but unpretentious; lightweight, but cute; inconsis­tent, but diverse enough to justify the inconsistencies — Starlight Express is Webber-fluff at its absolute best, and all the lovers of solid, patented fluff should join me here in my thumbs up. But if you have kids, just give them the record: do not expose them to the sight of one too many pairs of roller skates at the same time.

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The Beatles: A Hard Day's Night

THE BEATLES: A HARD DAY'S NIGHT (1964)

1) A Hard Day's Night; 2) I Should Have Known Better; 3) If I Fell; 4) I'm Happy Just To Dance With You; 5) And I Love Her; 6) Tell Me Why; 7) Can't Buy Me Love; 8) Any Time At All; 9) I'll Cry Instead; 10) Things We Said To­day; 11) When I Get Home; 12) You Can't Do That; 13) I'll Be Back.

Time has solidified the status of A Hard's Day Night as the one «early Beatles» album you have to get if you are only going to get one (although what sort of a silly person would settle for only one early Beatles album?) — if only for the objective reason that this is the only «early Beatles» album that consists entirely of originals; the next one like that would only be Rubber Soul, whe­re the band was already stepping into «maturity».

It is true that, in the UK at least, A Hard Day's Night sort of turned the whole idea of a «sound­track» on its head. In the States, which the Beatles had only just finished conquering in early '64, with the success of ʽI Want To Hold Your Handʼ, it was released as a «proper» soundtrack — seven songs on Side A and a bunch of movie-related instrumental versions of Side B (including, by the way, a very stylish, Duane Eddy-style, reworking of ʽThis Boyʼ as ʽRingo's Themeʼ — the one that is played in the movie as Ringo takes his solitary strolls upon «leaving» the band). But at home, the second side was completely unrelated to the first: six more songs, all of them originals, that had nothing to do with the movie. Yet the album was still, in some way, a «soundtrack», provoking the layman into thinking that, from now on, every recording with the Beatles name on it would be worth buying, even a collection of toothpaste commercials.

As for artistic growth, I would think that the strength of A Hard Day's Night lies in the details. At this point, «experimentation» was not yet an integral part of the Beatles' career: they did try out new ideas and approaches, but nobody seemed obsessed with them. John and Paul were burs­ting with melodies, not «concepts», and the only global thing that A Hard Day's Night proves us is that they do not really need those covers any more.

For one thing, up until now, the Beatles had a hard time coming up with original gritty rockers: other than ʽI Saw Her Standing Thereʼ and, to a lesser extent, ʽShe Loves Youʼ (which was rather just «loud» than truly «rocking»), they preferred to rock out on their cover versions (ʽTwist And Shoutʼ, ʽRoll Over Beethovenʼ, ʽMoneyʼ etc.). Now, with ʽCan't Buy Me Loveʼ they show that they can easily create a fast, kick-ass pop-rocker along with the best of them; and with ʽYou Can't Do Thatʼ, show that they can rock out in a mean, nasty, mid-tempo manner, holding their own on the same field with contemporary R'n'B-ers and blues-rockers (I have always thought that ʽYou Can't Do Thatʼ was John intentionally pulling a Mick).

On the other side of the field, ʽAnd I Love Herʼ establishes Paul as an independent, self-confident sweet balladeer for his generation — placed at approximately the same strategic juncture on the LP as ʽTill There Was Youʼ was on the previous album, and showing that the band no longer requires the services of Meredith Willson to feed its fans with wonderful roses and sweet, frag­rant meadows. Granted, Paul still cannot write a decent lyric to save his life, but does he need to? There is a certain minimalistic charm, this time around, in "I give her all my love / That's all I do / And if you saw my love / You'd love her too" that sits perfectly at home with the equally mini­malistic riff that drives the song. And there is a bit of self-confident tease at the end of the song as that minimalistic riff is «driven home» with four more bars. «Yes, I am so simple and silly, but you will never forget this coda anyway».

That said, at this time John is still the dominant presence in the band. Most songs were still writ­ten collectively, to be sure, yet the «Paul stamp» is strongly felt only on ʽAnd I Love Herʼ, ʽCan't Buy Me Loveʼ, and ʽThings We Said Todayʼ — a «miserable» three out of thirteen! (This might actually explain some of the exquisite fan worship towards the album). And by now, his song­wri­ting had reached that level of perfection from which it would never fall back again (except when he was derailed by avantgarde temptations or politics).

Of course, not all of his songs here are equally de­serving. On Side B, the unfortunate ʽWhen I Get Homeʼ frequently gets the flack for being somewhat cruder and less coherent in its melody than the rest (although the chief culprit is usually the lyrics: word-wise, it is like the little imbecile bro­ther of ʽA Hard Day's Nightʼ, and the line "I'm gonna love you till the cows come home", for some reason, has always irritated me). ʽI'll Cry Insteadʼ suffers notably from the lack of a guitar solo: it is quite a respectable little pseudo-rockabilly number as such, but way too repetitive as a result. Most importantly, they just don't look too good against the background of everything else.

Although John is overrepresented on the album and Paul is underrepresented, now that I think of it, the starkest contrast on the record is between the best songs of each one of them — and that contrast, funny enough, is just the opposite of the public's general opinion on their artistic and personal natures, because it is John who is primarily responsible for the brightest song on the al­bum and Paul who is behind the creation of the darkest one. Coincidence? Or just one of those «stereotypes suck» kind of moments?..

The «brightest» song is, of course, ʽI Should Have Known Betterʼ. It is utterly artificial, and yet it is probably the most successful attempt they ever made at capturing that «first love feeling» mood that made them into such invincible teenage deities. Three ingredients combine to make it a into such a mind-blower: John's massive harmonica runs, overwhelming all the other instruments for miles around; George's minimalistic, but brilliant solo that, once again, makes the right choice in mimicking John's already perfect vocal melody rather than trying futilely to invent something different; and the singing, of course — all the prolonged notes that bookmark the verses from both ends, all the "whoah-whoahs", all the sexy "oh-oh"s and dips into falsetto in the bridge sec­tion, so many individual snares within so short a track. And no croony sentimentality in sight. This is yer Good Youth incarnate; people unable to feel pure joy at the sound of this song are, at best, «stuck-up», and, at worst... oh, never mind.

The «darkest» song is, of course, ʽThings We Said Todayʼ. The lyrics are actually stronger here than on ʽAnd I Love Youʼ, but whether they really fit the doom and gloom of the tune is questio­nable. There is a little bit of irony in the words, but, overall, the theme of separation is much bet­ter indicated by the music: although the tempo is relatively fast and the rhythm is quite toe-tap-provoking, the minor mode of the song provokes an entirely different reaction. And as the whole thing eventually fades away on the same melody that opened it, it becomes the first in a relatively short line of «wholesale tragic» Beatle songs.

Actually, I would say that in general, there is a certain drift in A Hard Day's Night from Side A to Side B: the movie-related songs are, perhaps predictably, lighter, brighter, and fluffier, where­as, as we get to the second side, the mood darkens and solidifies a bit. John allows himself to be a nas­ty jealous guy on ʽYou Can't Do Thatʼ, Paul goes all melancholic on ʽThings You Said Todayʼ, and even the opening drum crack on ʽAnytime At Allʼ would probably seem a bit out of place, had they wanted to put that song in the movie as well. Then it all ends with ʽI'll Be Backʼ, a song that vies with ʽThingsʼ for the title of «saddest» — only barely losing out because the vocals do not quite manage to show that ominous tingle of "you say you will love me...".

It's just these little things, really, that elevate Hard Day's Night above the general «good pop al­bum» status. It may be all about trivial sentiments dressed in simple musical forms, but never in simple musical clichés. The slamming chord that opens the title track; the falsetto peaks on ʽI Should Have Known Betterʼ; the deletion of the verse/chorus opposition on ʽIf I Fellʼ; and so on and on and on, from the «light» of Side A to the relative «dark» of Side B.

There is nothing genu­inely «revolutionary» about Hard Day's Night, because the songwriting and the artistic personae of John and Paul had already become fully formed on With The Beatles. There is simply a sense of some sort of completeness: this is the ultimate «light-pop» experience of its epoch, and an experience that could not even theoretically be reproduced once pop-rock had gotten out of its infancy stage. It is, at the same time, utterly naïve / formulaic and hunting for genius musical decisions. Genius musical decisions would, of course, be quite plentiful in years to come, but the «virginity» would be lost forever. Look at all the «twee-pop» bands of today — many of them are quite fine, but nobody in his right mind strives to close up that hymen, under­standing well enough that it is impossible. Today, naïveness and innocence in attitude is reserved for the likes of Taylor Swift — mainstream puppets that are almost always the laughing stock of «advanced» music listeners. The miracle of Hard Day's Night is in that, even today, «advanced» music listeners may easily listen to it without laughing, and join me in my thumbs up.

P.S. A few words about the movie are probably in order as well. Time has been a little less kind to the movie than the accompanying album, I think. In 1964, it was seen as an even more colossal breakthrough: Richard Lester showed the world that a «pop artist movie» could actually be seen as an individual work of art, not just a dumb vehicle for the current teen idol to show off his cha­risma. That alone was a staggering discovery, rendering insignificant the fact that most of the Beatles could barely act (fortunately, Lester had the good sense not to ask them to act, so most of the time they were just being themselves — good news for John, worse for the rest of them), or that most of the jokes, puns, and gags, now that you look at them with a fresh eye, aren't really all that funny. (One exception is the cut-in scene between George and the advertising executive — some truly wicked dialog out there, as relevant for us today as it was fifty years ago, if not more so). Nevertheless, even if the movie is not as hot on its own as it is sometimes proclaimed to be, it is still one of the most fascinating — and, in a way, «authentic» — documents of its era. For best effect, watch it on a double bill with Viva Las Vegas.

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Blind Blake: Complete Recorded Works Vol. 3 (1928-1929)

BLIND BLAKE: COMPLETE RECORDED WORKS, VOL. 3 (1928-1929)

1) Elzadie's Policy Blues; 2) Pay Day Daddy Blues; 3) Walkin' Across The Country; 4) Search Warrant Blues; 5) Ramblin' Mama Blues; 6) New Style Of Loving; 7) Back Door Slam Blues; 8) Notoriety Woman Blues; 9) Cold Hearted Mama Blues; 10) Low Down Loving Gal; 11) Sweet Papa Low Down; 12) Poker Woman Blues; 13) Doing A Stretch; 14) Fightin' The Jug; 15) Hookworm Blues; 16) Slippery Rag; 17) Hastings Street; 18) Diddie Wah Did­die; 19) Too Tight Blues No. 2; 20) Chump Man Blues; 21) Ice Man Blues; 22) Police Dog Blues; 23) I Was Afraid Of That Pt. 2; 24) Georgia Bound; 25) Keep It Home.

Vol. 3 of Blind Blake's starts out rather inauspiciously, with a couple of fairly bland Elzadie Ro­binson urban blues tunes which are then followed with lotsa lotsa slow blues, most of them with hi­deous sound quality that prevents from discerning any tricks and flourishes even if Blake actu­ally had them on these tracks — and I am quite unsure of that. (He gets particularly lazy on tracks like ʽSearch Warrant Bluesʼ, whose recording session must have caught him in an utterly un­in­spired state, or an utterly inebriated one). These six or seven slow blues laments are really only noticeable for the lyrics, which have been occasionally accused of excessive (even for the times) misogyny ("to keep her quiet, I knocked her teeth out her mouth" etc.). But since Blake hardly ever comes across as a pathological character, we should still ascribe these bleak feelings to then-current conventions. Good old happy times, when «bitch-slapping» was the norm and nobody wanted to be left out of the fun.

The real fun — musical fun — starts only on the eleventh number (ʽSweet Papa Low Downʼ), the first feel-good number on the CD, and Blind Blake's fingers only really worked wonders when they were feeling good: here be a nifty little Charleston with some cornet and xylophone accom­paniment, and Blake himself happily mumbling and dee-daa-daaing under his nose as he spins his tricky ragtime chords.

From there, as we move on to 1929 and the last months of nationwide happiness, it is all steadily uphill once again: ʽHookworm Bluesʼ, with a funny guitar/piano soloing duet; ʽSlippery Ragʼ, which is anything but slippery — in fact, it features some of Blake's most complex soloing; and, most importantly, ʽDiddie Wah Diddieʼ, one of his signature tunes (nothing to do with the much later Bo Diddley song of the same name) that introduced the line "I wish somebody could tell me what diddie wah diddie means" into popular culture.

Best of the lot is concealed at the end: ʽGeorgia Boundʼ, also done in a ragtime tuning, recorded with a rare degree of cleanness, sung with an unexpected sweet natural tenderness, and bursting into diverse, but always optimistic solo melodies after each verse. The melody may be well known from a million other performances (it is exactly the same as Robert Johnson's ʽFrom Four Until Lateʼ), but, with Blake at the helm, a good melody will always bear individual traces, re­gardless of how well we know it. If you do not play guitar, these sounds may well taunt you into trying — and if you do, you might as well quit, because you'll never beat this kind of sound, no matter how technically simple it might seem to the modern player. Thumbs up.

Blitzen Trapper: Wild Mountain Nation

BLITZEN TRAPPER: WILD MOUNTAIN NATION (2007)

1) Devil's A Go-Go; 2) Wild Mountain Nation; 3) Futures & Folly; 4) Miss Spiritual Tramp; 5) Woof & Warp Of The Quiet Giant's Hem; 6) Sci-Fi Kid; 7) Wild Mtn. Jam; 8) Hot Tip / Tough Cub; 9) The Green King Sings; 10) Summer Town; 11) Murder Babe; 12) Country Caravan; 13) Badger's Black Brigade.

Switching from the phantom label of «LidKerCow» to the very much real Sub Pop records, Blitz­en Trapper finally announce their existence to a whole wide world outside Oregon, with their loudest, braggard-est, and best produced record yet. Actually, a correction: they do not so much want to come out into the whole wide world as they want the whole wide world to come to them. "Come out from the world and into my arms / Like wind on the water with me / Come out from the city come out from the town / Build stone by stone a wild mountain home". This is the way the title track greets you, on a shallow warm wave of slide and electric guitars and a swaying an­themic rhythm that goes particularly well with a mug or two.

But Blitzen Trapper are not The Avett Brothers, and their wildland hearts never stay for too long in the wildlands: their real ambition stays the same — to capture all sorts of audiences by means of an intelligent synthesis. This is where the bearded hillbilly is supposed to peacefully coinhabit the same territory with the smug hipster, trading quite a few floating genes in the process. Why they have to do this, other than provide a reason for another rock band's existence, is another question... and it is up to each one of us to decide if we want to enrich our meaning of life by try­ing as hard as we can to find the answer.

At this point, a responsible reviewer would need to write something like «Me, I'm too busy just enjoying all the cool music to give a damn». The problem is — despite all of Earley's unquestio­nable talent, this music is just way too cool to be normally enjoyable. It begs for all sorts of ques­tions, and provokes confusion after confusion. The band's previous albums were, after all, a little less «over the top», but on Wild Mountain Nation they pull so many different rabbits out of the hat that, eventually, the magic show turns into a zoo.

ʽDevil's A-Go-Goʼ kicks off the proceedings with a three-minute multipart suite that includes elements of power pop, tricky Captain Beefheart-influenced avantgarde rhythms, Grateful Dead-style mind-melting psychedelia, and a noisy dissolution into chaos. Out of its ashes rises the title track — mind you, these guys that beg you to come to their wild mountains with them are the same ones that just infested your mind with a ridiculously incoherent concatenation, so I would think twice, personally, before «saddling up to ride». Then, after being lulled into a peaceful easy feeling with the colorful, bouncy folk-pop of ʽFutures & Follyʼ and its McCartney spirit, you are immediately given a gut-kick by the thick Panzer distortion of ʽMiss Spiritual Trampʼ — a hard-rocking sound through which, however, they still seep through occasional slide guitars and har­mo­nicas, just to place the «rootsy-tootsy» seal on everything, for protection.

Actually, it all sounds great. The soft songs lull and pacify, the loud songs invite the air guitar, and the avantgarde / experimental bits and pieces are a fine glue to keep the soft and loud songs together. It all sounds so great that you do not even immediately notice the utter silliness of some­thing like ʽWoof & Warp Of The Quiet Giant's Hemʼ — even if, in reality, it is just a repetitive, off-yer-head carnival stomp where you are supposed to jump around the fire and shout «yeah yeah yeah» to spook off a bloodthirsty demon or something. It simply falls in place as part of that crazy kaleidoscope: a bit of its own craziness rubs off on everything else.

But you know what? I would rather have preferred it all with a different sequencing. For instance, place all the quiet acoustic songs on one side and all the wild romps on the other. Because I feel that the quiet songs are actually the stronger ones, reflecting a juicier, brighter side of Earley's heart than his attempts to make himself feel at home with the loud rock scene. ʽSummer Townʼ, in particular, is a beautiful ballad, all minimalistic acoustic lines, flutes, and soft psychedelic overdubs, one of those tunes where you cannot decide whether it is melancholy or tenderness that rules the scene, and this indecision keeps sucking you in. And my personal fav is ʽCountry Cara­vanʼ, one of those tunes where you know that all that separates this rather ordinary country-pop tune from greatness is the lack of a big fat friendly electric guitar solo, and then it finally comes and you're all like, "I knew it! Didn't I?"...

Yet with all this mixing going on, neither the soft nor the hard songs help out each other. It is one thing to have yourself a White Album, one that can allow itself to disregard sequencing because each number is so strong on its own that it creates a special link to its context in your mind regar­dless of whether that link was originally planned or not. Eric Earley, on the other hand, is no J. P. Len­non-McCartney, and these songs are not highly memorable — they are of the «make you feel so good while they're on» kind rather than the «forever and ever you'll stay in my heart» kind. And Wild Mountain Nation's eclectic mix keeps confusing me. On the good side of things, it means that I will definitely be coming back here, to keep checking on the potential greatness I have missed; but on the bad side of things, the overall reaction is still a large question mark, and I wouldn't want to be coming back without some sort of guarantee that I will not be wasting my time. Anyway, thumbs up for the ongoing mystery of Blitzen Trapper while it is still a mystery.

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Archers Of Loaf: All The Nations Airports

ARCHERS OF LOAF: ALL THE NATIONS AIRPORTS (1996)

1) Strangled By The Stereo Wire; 2) All The Nations Airports; 3) Scenic Pastures; 4) Worst Defense; 5) Attack Of The Killer Bees; 6) Rental Sting; 7) Assassination On X-mas Eve; 8) Chumming The Ocean; 9) Vocal Shrapnel; 10) Bones Of Her Hands; 11) Bumpo; 12) Form And File; 13) Acromegaly; 14) Distance Comes In Droves; 15) Bombs Away.

For their third release, the Archers got picked up by a major label — Elektra — but the fact pro­duced far more fuss in the press than change in the sound. Not that there isn't any change in the sound from Vee Vee to All The Nations Airports. There is. But it has nothing to do with labels. And yes, it is a sucky sort of change.

Essentially, to me this sort of change suggests that Vee Vee, after all, was a fluke. Somehow, on that album, the band managed to align their mutual configuration in the only possible, and very subtle way, that could make them stand out. They probably did not pay too much attention to this lucky turn of events — and, when it was time to reconvene for the third album, fell back on the old configuration of Icky Mettle. Only now they lack even that initial punch of freshness which can sometimes elevate mediocrity to illusionary heights. Results? Boring. Dull as hell.

Instead of good music, Bachmann now concentrates almost exclusively on the lyrics, which get increasingly «serious» and «messagy», without telling us explicitly what it is about them that could make Bachmann an individual presence on the «rock poet» scene. "Rental sting / The cus­tomer is king / Waste your life, waste your life / Little things can cost you everything" — here is a particularly telling example of what it's all about. If it clicks with you on paper, it will click with you on your stereo. If it does not click on paper, I have a hard time imagining how All The Nations Airports could ever occupy a special place in your heart.

That the individual guitar parts are rather dull is no surprise; the surprise is that they seem to have lost the ability to turn their twin guitar interplay into something larger than the sum of its parts. It is most evident on such lumbering instrumental monsters as ʽAttack Of The Killer Beesʼ, which, by all means, should have been titled ʽAttack Of The Killer Slothsʼ instead — one of the guitars does produce a bee-like buzz all the way through (wailing like crazy on one note while your ears are slowly and painfully being electrocuted), but the others are just droning stoner grunge chords over and over again in an «atmospheric» manner that is neither pleasant, nor even novel.

They are still capable of occasionally coming across mildly interesting themes, when they get off their main saddle horse: ʽBumpoʼ is a fun instrumental, built upon a dark psycho-folk theme that is half-Jefferson Airplane, half-James Bond theme (although even ʽBumpoʼ gets less attractive and more generic once the volume levels are pushed up and the minimalistic folk guitar becomes drone-oriented). And there are tiny bits and pieces that suggest ways of greatness — for instance, the way the self-titled track begins, with its siren-like bass notes and pick scraping frenzy, before it embarrassingly turns into just another Bachmann sermon.

But tiny bits are one thing, and preaching, lying at the heart of 75% of the songs on here, is ano­ther. ʽAssassination On X-mas Eveʼ, for instance, simply continues the theme of ʽDeath In The Parkʼ — «bad shit is going on, and nobody genuinely gives a damn». There is no harm in flog­ging that old horse to death, particularly since the horse is immortal, but wouldn't it be nice if the accompanying music were even the least bit memorable? Or, at least, exciting? Come on now, this shit is just excruciatingly dull. I can't even hear that second «feminine» guitar all that well, bring it higher up in the mix or something (not that it looks as if it were doing anything even re­motely approaching the occasional explosiveness on Vee Vee).

As ʽBombs Awayʼ, a minimalistic two-finger piano instrumental, closes the record, I cannot help but wonder how these things happen exactly — what are the factors that determine such jumps in quality between albums that are essentially based on the same styles and values. The number of cups of coffee drunk before the morning sessions? Toothaches? Undetected radioactivity ex­po­sure? Talent drain, where «talent» = an objectively measurable internal fluid? Whatever. Regard­less of the answer, All The Nations Airports is a significant departure from Vee Vee, and, in my head, the vector is strictly downwards, so thumbs down accordingly.

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