CABARET VOLTAIRE: MIX-UP (1979)
1) Kirlian Photograph; 2) No
Escape; 3) Fourth Shot; 4) Heaven And Hell; 5) Eyeless Sight; 6) Photophobia;
7) On Every Other Street; 8) Expect Nothing; 9) Capsules.
It doesn't take much more than Cabaret
Voltaire's debut album to understand why they are a band that is mentioned in every
single account of the history of New Wave — and, at the same time, a band that
people very, very rarely actually listen to. Like many of their contemporaries,
they have fallen victim to the «why should I listen to this if it's not 1979
any more?» curse; unlike most of these contemporaries, they suffer from the
curse even more strongly because at least other
people would come up with melodies, and then clothe them in gimmicky electronic
arrangements that sounded fascinating upon first listen, irritating upon second
listen, and ridiculous upon the third one. Cabaret Voltaire did not bother coming
up with melodies. I mean, you don't call yourself Cabaret Voltaire just to go
on being a pop band, right?
On the other hand, Cabaret Voltaire weren't
about making experimental chaotic noise, either. From the very beginning, they
respected the groove, so much so that, no matter how strange, all of Mix-Up is eminently danceable, and the
best way to approach this material is to look at it as a sort of electronic-shamanistic
ritual — exorcism muzak for the new age. It is no coincidence that the first
track refers to the art of «Kirlian photography», a widespread practice in
parapsychology and freak pseudoscience: had they formed in 1969, the band would
probably worship Aleister Crowley, but in the post-Star Wars era, who'd want spiritual elevation without futurism,
technophilia, and hissing tape loops?
Ideologically, they take their cues from The
Velvet Underground: rhythm is treated as merely a compromising measure that
helps you ease into the repetitive, evil weirdness of the sound, even if
guitars, pianos, and violins are largely replaced with even more cold, gray,
and merciless electronic devices (although Richard H. Kirk's rough, droning
guitar sound is usually an integral component). One important element of that
ideology that is almost missing, though, is improvisation: most of these tracks
are produced with a lot of overdubbing, and the atmosphere of spontaneity that
was so important for classic VU is nowhere to be found.
Another thing is «depersonalisation» — the
entire album is completely faceless, dehumanized; again, this approach may have
been all the rage in 1979, but today, when you turn towards the past in search
of impressive faces, this seems to have a disheartening effect. Vocalist
Stephen Mallinder does not have to resort to the antiquated practice of singing
— he intones at best, and usually
lays so much reverb and echo on his vocals that he ends up sounding like a
semi-organic alien over a real bad radio transmission. Chris Watson's synthesizers
hiss, hum, and rattle rather than vibrate in a musical fashion, and the
guitars, as I already mentioned, are usually just there for a droning effect.
At the same time, I would hesitate to call this «industrial» music, like many
people do: it is certainly very
different from the likes of both Einstürzende Neubauten and Throbbing Gristle,
if only because relatively little importance is being attached to percussive effects
(most of the drumming here is represented by fairly simplistic drum machine
patterns), and also because the band's worship of the groove is stronger than
their worship of the «factory hum» principle. But who cares about the words?
Let's call this «industrial dance music», like a distant ancestor to Björk's
ʽCvaldaʼ.
Individual tracks are not worth commenting upon
— other than, perhaps, the band's sci-fi cover of The Seeds' ʽNo Escapeʼ, on
which the original garage rock guitar part is substituted for a «sci-fi garage»
duet of hoarsely distorted guitar and synth. Again, though, its importance is
more of a symbolic nature — with this song, they proclaim themselves as inheritors
of the entire «caveman rock» tradition of the previous decade, except now they
have more advanced technology to develop it (ironically, in 2015 that advanced
technology sounds even more antiquated than The Seeds' crappily played/recorded
electric guitars). Other than that, it is just one shrill, somber, nasty,
dull-gray musical landscape after another, curious to look upon but not all
that enchanting. Or scary, for that matter — Joy Division, with their suicidal
vibe, were scary; Kraftwerk's ʽRobotsʼ, so vivid and complete in their technofascistic
imagery, were scary; these guys,
however, did not have a complete vision, they were just actively searching for
one.
Nevertheless, Mix-Up is not nearly as boring as this review would seem to picture
it. Due to the band's relentless experimentation, there is a wide variety of
tempos; the same groove never repeats itself twice; Kirk likes to drift from
one guitar tone to another, and sometimes makes fairly amusing guitar noises
(on ʽCapsulesʼ, for instance, his guitar tries to croak its way through the
same frequencies as Mallinder's vocal «melody»); and even during the worst
moments you can still toe-tap to the rhythms (only ʽPhotophobiaʼ loses it for a
while). Repeated listens will bring out many subtle nuances as well. The
biggest problem, in fact, is that the record really is much less experimental
and innovative than it seems to proclaim itself — even in 1979, the only way
people in Sheffield could be really stunned
would be if they never previously heard Can's Tago Mago or anything by Faust. Which, I'm guessing, admittedly comprises
the majority of the population of Sheffield — but then again, Cabaret Voltaire
never really played for majorities, did they?
No comments:
Post a Comment