ANATHEMA: A FINE DAY TO EXIT (2001)
1) Pressure; 2) Release; 3)
Looking Outside Inside; 4) Leave No Trace; 5) Underworld; 6) (Breaking Over
The) Barriers; 7) Panic; 8) A Fine Day To Exit; 9) Temporary Peace.
Normally, an album titled A Fine Day To Exit would probably be expected from a band that decides
to call it a day — but we are dealing with Anathema here, a band for whom
calling it a day is pretty much a profession, except they're calling it a day
for humanity as a whole, rather than just their own sorry asses. So no, they
are not disbanding: this is merely the next installation in the ongoing series
of «numb and number», and, unfortunately, not an improvement on the flaws of Judgement, but rather an exacerbation
of said flows.
By this time, it seems like they might be
taking their clues from Radiohead rather than Pink Floyd, with most of the
songs showing a quiet, tired, enfeebled type of depression and disillusionment,
as conveyed by weighted-down vocals, morose piano lines, and atmospheric use of
electronics, although not enough of the latter to suggest interference with Kid A: rather, it is the alt-rock Bends version and the art-rock OK Computer version of Radiohead that
serve as primary cue-setters. Slow, atmospheric, depressing songs, only
occasionally livened up by faster tempos that still preserve the same
atmosphere (ʽPanicʼ) and always suggesting being trapped without any hope of
escape in the deep, dark well of one's own subconscious, except that, unlike
Radiohead, lyrics-wise they are still unable to escape the «always talking with
the ghost of my brutally mutilated lover» cliché.
That cliché is, however, far from the worst
problem of the album — the worst problem is that most of the songs are honestly
no good. Like that Radiohead atmosphere or not, it was always supported by
radical, challenging, or at least instantly memorable musical ideas. Here,
though, as the Cavanagh brothers are assisted by drummer John Douglas in their
songwriting duties, I fail to find anything that would sound genuinely unusual
or memorable. The songs take too much time to do too few interesting things.
The pianos and acoustic guitars sound nice, but do not take any serious chances
outside of the predictably comfortable zones of adult-pop balladeering and dark
(or not too dark) folk strumming. And the electric guitars, when they do come
in, largely sound like any average alt-rock band would sound — basic grungy
patterns that even Radiohead had largely left behind by 1995.
The very first song on the album, ʽPressureʼ,
which was also released as a single, begins in full-out ʽKarma Policeʼ mode,
jamming your ears in between big echoey drums and forcefully hit piano chords,
but this all just seems like a moody setup for the vocal melody, and the vocal
melody seems like just a setup for the chorus, with all the stakes placed on
the culmination of "I don't care where you go, you won't get away from
me", and, frankly, it's not much of a culmination — the singer sounds so
bored with himself, these words resonate like an empty threat. If there is any pressure, it's hardly above
permissible levels. I can understand why the vocals never shoot past the murmur
level, or why there is no shrill guitar solo to juice up the crescendo, but see,
these are fairly ordinary musical moves that they use to create the atmosphere,
and if you're making an ordinary song, you are at least entitled to juice it
up with ordinary, but efficient musical clichés. «Tastelessly exciting» takes
preference over «tastefully boring», and it's not even all that tasteful to
begin with (though it cannot be said that they are embarrassing themselves with
this attitude, either, like they often did on the early albums).
And if that's ʽPressureʼ for us, then what
about ʽReleaseʼ? Surely this title should be concealing some climactic
denouement of its predecessor? Reveal a shattering musical explosion? It begins
promising enough — a thin, sharp acoustic guitar tone, lightly attenuated with
a simmering electronic pattern; eventually, more and more synth overdubs start
piling up in anticipation of the climax... and that climax? A weak, monotonous
texture of funky electric guitar overdubs merging in a generic alt-rock grind.
Well... like "pressure", like "release".
The record continues in the same mediocre
manner, alternating heavier and lighter moments in such a smooth and polite
manner that you hardly ever notice the transitions, and offering us vocal parts
that are so gentlemanly refined that I almost begin to wonder — couldn't it
have been more effective for them to go back to growling vocals? Probably not,
but this is just way too soporific
for my aural nerves. And almost as if they wanted to really rub it in, the last track (ʽTemporary Peaceʼ) seems like a
bad parody on a conceptual post-rock suite: a moody, hookless Gothic ballad
part, followed by a couple minutes of seawaves crashing upon the shore (wait,
did I say "crashing?"... nothing on this album is
"crashing"... more like "swishing"...), followed by a
couple more minutes of gravel-crushing footsteps on the shore and disjoint
pieces of recorded conversation, followed by a few minutes of total silence,
and then followed with a two-chord acoustic ditty with seemingly improvised «comical»
lyrics ("Morten Harket's brand new go cart / Foul mouthed and smelling of
onions"). Actually, the acoustic ditty might be the best part of the album
because it is at least the only thing about it that is not so totally safe and
predictable.
So, unfortunately, a thumbs down — even if this is
not a stereotypically «bad» record, this is one of those cases where I'd rather
sit through Aerosmith's Pump or
Britney Spears' In The Zone, because
those records, bad as they are, at least give you food for thought and
impressions to keep. A Fine Day To Exit,
on the contrary, shows that the boys mean
good (they are actually trying to find some serious justification for being so
depressed), but they don't really have the means, such as brilliant songwriting
and inventive arrangements, to do
good.
First paragraph has "flows" instead of "flaws" at the end; you might want to fix that.
ReplyDeleteErr, what's all this then? Weren't these guys a metal band 5 minutes ago?
ReplyDelete