Allo Darlin': Europe

ALLO DARLIN': EUROPE (2012)

1) Neil Armstrong; 2) Capricornia; 3) Europe; 4) Some People Say; 5) Northern Lights; 6) Wonderland; 7) Tallulah; 8) The Letter; 9) Still Young; 10) My Sweet Friend.

Damn you, Elizabeth Morris. I really, really like you. You seem like a fun person to hang out with for somebody who hates hanging out with people – with just the perfect mix of sarcasm and idealism to pass for «the real thing». Smart, but not condescending. Stylish, but not garish. Pretty, but not beautiful. Childish, but never infantile. Hipsterish, but never over-the-top outrageous. A fine, upstan­ding example for any 21st cen­tury girl who might be looking for one.

So why then did you have to go and make your second album... no, not a «carbon copy» of the first one, more like an endless set of variations on one particular style? Essentially, if you have al­ready heard ʽThe Polaroid Songʼ, you have heard most of Europe. If ʽThe Polaroid Songʼ is your life, afterlife, and post-Apocalypse rolled in one, Europe will bring utter satisfaction. And hey, I like it too. But when your entire LP consists of upbeat, monotonous twee-pop, stubbornly based around jangle, jangle, and even more jangle, you just get to thinking: «hey, wait a minute, I kind of thought ʽsunshine popʼ was more than just that?!..»

The basic sound of Allo Darlin' remains as delicious as it ever was. The jangle is vivacious and friendly, and Morris' voice is a master weapon: as long as she keeps it that way, no song released by the band will ever be utterly worthless. But that's just it: the sound. The sound totally triumphs over the songs, all of which are interchangeable. The individual bits of magic, such as the heart–breaking guitar riff on ʽMy Heart Is A Drummerʼ, are nowhere in sight. God knows I've tried looking — a miserable failure every time. Just one pretty, generic jangle pattern after another. Enough, in the end, to make you crave for some AC/DC.

The only exception from the formula is ʽTallulahʼ, which is just Liz and her ukulele. Feather-light, touching, pretty — problem is, the rhythmic pattern is just about the same as the one in ʽHeart­beat Chilliʼ, and the vocal melody is hookless. It's as if she's just expressively reading a little bit of her diary, accompanied by a little strumming. Is that the way you save the world? And don't tell me that Allo Darlin' aren't here to save the world. They are. They just need to stop sucking their lollipops, 'sall.

ʽNeil Armstrongʼ and ʽCapricorniaʼ start things off with probably the strongest jangle patterns of 'em all. In about five seconds' time, you are already acquainted with the major charms of the for­mer (a little folk-rock riff, reminding of Dylan's ʽI Don't Believe Youʼ), but you will have to wait about fifty seconds for ʽCapricorniaʼ to hit its full stride and become a full-fledged Byrds-appro­ved extravaganza from mid-1965 — all that's missing is invite ol' man Crosby to sing backup.

I refuse to name any more names, with the possible exception of ʽThe Letterʼ, which does ac­tually try to re­create a little of the echoey magic of ʽMy Heartʼ. It would force me to be more cri­tical, and I don't want to be any more critical. I like the sound, I like the band, I'd like to replicate millions of clones of Elizabeth Morris to replace the millions of clones of Rebecca Black, but I just cannot, for the life of me, remember any of these songs. Somebody get Sir Paul McCartney to join this goddamn band. Something should be done. A thumbs down is just not right here, yet a thumbs down is still all I have for this disaster. Don't they teach songwriting in Australia?..

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At The Drive-In: Acrobatic Tenement

AT THE DRIVE-IN: ACROBATIC TENEMENT (1996)

1) Star Slight; 2) Schaffino; 3) Ebroglio; 4) Initiation; 5) Communication Drive-In; 6) Skips On The Record; 7) Paid Vacation Time; 8) Ticklish; 9) Blue Tag; 10) Coating Of Arms; 11) Porfirio Diaz.

«Early Texan post-hardcore». Don't you just love it when it's that easy to pigeonhole? It's really the next step that is far more difficult to take. For instance, what is post-hardcore? If it really is something, is there any real need for it? Are there any generic traits of Texan post-hardcore that distinguish it from LA post-hardcore? Is this band good, or what?

So, instead of answering all these questions and drowning the review in terminology debates, let me just try to explain what the whole thing is like. Two interlocking guitars playing drones and jazz-influenced lead lines — an approach that reminds one of Television, only these guys are pre­dictably louder and wilder. A lead vocalist with a heavy nasal twang who considers singing an af­front to good taste, but is not strong enough for proper barking. Songs that are utterly unmemo­rable and often undistinguishable from each other, but still have invigorating potential. Impres­sionistic lyrics that never make the slightest sense, but still spit out the collective unconscious. And — poor, but not awful, production values (not bad for $600, I'd say).

Such is Acrobatic Tenement, an album that is usually said to capture At The Drive-In still in their formative phase. But since they eventually spent more time in the formative phase than in the fully formed one, we might just as well consider it their first «masterpiece», as far as this par­ticular style of making music is concerned.

The problem with reviewing this style is that it does nothing for me. Except for the slower, bass-heavier, moodier «ballad» ʽInitiationʼ, where Bixler's vocals occasionally try to turn to falsetto, everything else sticks together in a shapeless mess. It is not a noisy mess: the guitars favor the drone over the chainsaw buzz, and the collective effect frequently lands in the same ballpark with Velvet Underground jams or even avantgarde jazz stuff. But there is nothing particularly fresh, startling, or interesting about this drone. The guitars don't play anything that you haven't already heard from the Velvets, Television, Sonic Youth, Fugazi, or some other bunch of smelly jerks; and Bixler seems capable of one single vocal intonation, which sounds invigorating on the first track, familiar on the second, predictable on the third, annoying on the fourth, irritating on the fifth, and from then on it's just KILL KILL KILL.

If you want a good sampling of what these guys can do best when they are «weaving» their gui­tars, check out ʽSkips On The Recordʼ with its mix of drones and wobbles; or ʽTicklishʼ, which has some nice speedy picking there — but only if you already have a propensity for this kind of music, because if you are not already genetically engineered to adore «post-hardcore», Acrobatic Tene­ment will probably not convince you. If you want to see these guys at their most obviously «heartfelt», check out ʽEbroglioʼ, dedicated to a close friend who committed suicide that year: perhaps Jim Ward's and Adam Amparan's guitars will inflict catharsis, and Bixler's singing will make the stars shine bright on a cloudy day.

But if you do not want anything by yourself, I am certainly not going to insist that you rush out and hear the album at all. At best, it is better than a lot of noisy, flash-in-the-pan hardcore that it grew out of. Can that be a compliment? Nope. In reality, At The Drive-In only recorded one good LP in their brief lifetime, and this one's not it. Thumbs down.

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Aztec Camera: Knife

AZTEC CAMERA: KNIFE (1984)

1) Still On Fire; 2) Just Like The USA; 3) Head Is Happy (Heart's Insane); 4) The Back Door To Heaven; 5) All I Need Is Everything; 6) Backwards And Forwards; 7) The Birth Of The True; 8) Knife.

«Atmosphere». Why do people sometimes think that, once they got «atmosphere», they got eve­ry­­thing? Why do they sometimes think that, just because they have gained access to electronic equipment, the «atmosphere» that they create with it will be properly expressing their hearts' de­sires and sentiments? Why did Knife put a quick and humiliating end to Roddy Frame's conquest of the world? Fuckin' atmosphere.

Oh, I'm not talking about short-term commercial success. In the UK, it charted all right, on the heels of the high reputation of its predecessor and further boosted by the choice of Mark Knopfler as producer (and some members of Dire Straits guest-starring in the studio as well). However, it only yielded one single, ʽAll I Need Is Everythingʼ, which failed to repeat the success of ʽOblivi­ousʼ, and overall, it was clear that Frame did not intend Knife to be a singles-oriented collection at all. Instead, he probably intended for it to show more maturity, seriousness, and psychological depth: the 20-year old songwriter was already getting too old for simplistic dance music, the new charge had to show a sophisticatedly intelligent glow to it. The band didn't simply choose Mark Knopfler because of his fame — they went after his image as a wise old young man. They forgot that, as a side effect, the man could also be deadly boring, and inflict his boredom on others at will. That is exactly what happened.

First and foremost, Knife sounds nothing like its predecessor. The first album was completely dominated by acoustic and, less frequently, electric guitar. On Knife, keyboards, played by Guy Fletcher, climb to the top of the mountain from the very start and very, very rarely get down from there. This alone makes the whole thing rather unexceptional as far as commercial music from 1984 is concerned. Second, placing most of his effort in the lyrics, Roddy seems nowhere near as concerned about the musical hooks as he used to be. I don't know, maybe he thought Knopfler would be providing the hooks somehow, with his production. Wait a bit... Knopfler providing the hooks? All Dire Straits fans like myself are supposed to see the irony in this.

There are a couple of songs, for sure, that feature occasional pretty / bouncy guitar lines. ʽAll I Need Is Everythingʼ is actually one of them, and is close in mood to matching the intelligent ro­mantic optimism of High Land. But ooh, these rotten keyboards, «atmospherically» sighing in the background and casio-chuckling in the foreground. And the generic Spanish guitar solo at the end? Who needs that? Atmosphere strikes again. ʽJust Like The USAʼ, a song that has nothing to do with the USA and everything to do with Roddy's attempts to evaluate his place in the world, is actually much better — it's the only song on the album where the guitar remains charming and playful throughout. Nowhere else is the poor instrument allowed that much freedom.

Most of the compositions actually roll along at a steady, unnerving, unchanging, flat mid-tempo, serving as carriers for Roddy's poems. They are interesting poems, for sure, ambiguous, open to various interpretations, but who is really going to wreck his brain trying to decipher the intellec­tual message of something like ʽThe Back Door To Heavenʼ? "My eyes are stuck on sleepless dreams / The world is never what it seems / We've sold it short, it's what we're taught / Lost it in the living" — okay there, Roddy, it's an acceptable, if familiar, message, but why accompany it with such insipid music? This way, you will never in a million years convince anybody that "the back door to heaven is open wide to me". If the back door to heaven is anything like this generic set of flourishes, I'd much rather use the front.

The nadir is left for the end. The title track is not a cover of the classic Genesis composition (not that there could really be any hope), but a nine-minute original, dragging along at a snail's pace, intended to become Frame's ultimate confession, but set back by a complete lack of melody — nothing but atmosphere, created in the same predictable way. Serious minor chords on the piano, philosophically colored repetitive guitar lines, a one or two-note bassline dripping along like a broken faucet, and vocals that plead, sigh, and complain instead of singing. Of course, every one in a thousand, or one in ten thousand people, or whatever, will find the effect mesmerizing and heartbreaking. Try it out — you may be one of the few lucky ones. I happen to find every single component of the composition unoriginal, un-individual, and devoid of sensual or intellectual stimulation. In other words, it's a horrific bore.

I really hate it when a magnificent first album gives way to a heavily disappointing second one, and in each such case, I would really, really like to think that the problem is somehow only in me, not in the music. But then, what can I do? Me and High Land took to each other rather quickly; me and Knife feel no mutual empathy whatsoever. Maybe it's just because I like bouncy acoustic guitar more than I like crawling electronic keyboards. Maybe it's more complicated than that. Maybe I'm not getting this whole «maturity» thing. Maybe I instinctively hate Mark Knopfler, whose second album was also a major disappointment after the first one, and who may have, since then, inflicted the same damage on everybody he produced. But I gotta say this — Brothers In Arms, whatever be, was a much better album than Knife. Which gets me thinking that Roddy Frame might have managed a great cover of ʽWalk Of Lifeʼ. But not ʽMoney For Nothingʼ. He doesn't have enough spite in him to cover ʽMoney For Nothingʼ. Thumbs down.

PS. The album sleeve is unquestionably the coolest thing about it, but it does not match the con­tents one bit. Take my warning.

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Bad Company: Fame And Fortune

BAD COMPANY: FAME AND FORTUNE (1986)

1) Burning Up; 2) This Love; 3) Fame And Fortune; 4) That Girl; 5) Tell It Like It Is; 6) Long Walk; 7) Hold On My Heart; 8) Valerie; 9) When We Made Love; 10) If I'm Sleeping.

Had this band enjoyed a little less fame, and had I had a little more fortune, I would not be ob­liged to review this at all. But it so happened that, after the initial dissolution of Bad Company after Rough Diamonds, as Mick Ralphs and Simon Kirke were about to team up with ex-Nugent vocalist Brian Howe for just a little fun and a little cash, some thugs at Atlantic convinced them that the cash would be flowing far steadier if triggered by the good old moniker. Besides, how could 1986, arguably the worst year for commercially oriented music in the XXth century, begin and end without a Bad Company album?

Not that Fame And Fortune sounds anything like old time Bad Company. Instead, it sounds like new time Foreigner — no surprise, since it was produced by Foreigner's producer Keith Olsen. Thus, folksy and bluesy stylizations are mostly out, replaced by bombastic arena-rock. Heavy, but glossy-safe guitar riffs, crappy cheap keyboards all over the place (played by Gregg Dechert, whose only claim to fame so far was playing for Uriah Heep in 1980-81), electronic echo on the drums, and a generic pop vocalist with Siegfried-size ambitions. Whoo!

It goes without saying that there isn't a single song on here that even barely approaches «good». The only possible question is «in a better time and place, could any of these songs be better?» I am not sure. The riffs are fairly rotten, and the vocal melodies are mostly dependent on how much pathos the new singer guy is capable of generating. Considering that 99% of the time he flat out refuses to sing like a normal human being, I am not sure that replacing him with a Ray Davies could have saved the situation.

Particularly low points involve the power ballad ʽWhen We Made Loveʼ (on which Howe's little «rasp» seems even more annoying than usual); the awful teen pop send-up ʽThat Girlʼ (unless the chorus reall goes fat girl!, which is how I hear it every time, in which case it's self-ironic... nah, not really); and the humiliating ʽHold On My Heartʼ, a suspicious attempt to write something in the style of Born In The USA — except that it takes more than simply mimicking Bruce's brea­thy intonations to succeed.

The only track here that deserves half a grain of attention is ʽTell It Like It Isʼ, a rougher-edged rocker, generally unspoiled by keyboards and somewhat strengthened by a well-meaning sax backing. This one could be thought of as slightly watered-down, less focused and intense AC/DC, and in the context of all the chest-beating, synth-pumping dreck on here it almost feels like real rock'n'roll. Of course, there is still no reason to keep its memories in your head one hour after the fact. Useless, spiritually and intellectually offensive dreck. Even honest, hard-working truck dri­vers — the band's most faithful audience — acknowledged that at the time, judging by the charts. Total thumbs down.

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Argent: Circus

ARGENT: CIRCUS (1975)

1) Circus; 2) Highwire; 3) Clown; 4) Trapeze; 5) Shine On Sunshine; 6) The Ring; 7) The Jester.

So Ballard is out, replaced by not one, but two guitarists — John Grimaldi and John Verity, and thus begins the final, very brief, stage of Argent, almost completely ignored by history. Only one of the band's last two albums has so far been released on CD, and even so, finding it is quite a treat. Unjustly: Circus is really as fine a record as Rod could produce under the circumstances. Working almost alone, with a little help from bassist Jim Rodford (who wrote ʽTrapezeʼ), having to sing much of the material himself, but still refusing to move in overtly commercial directions — and still displaying plenty of inspiration.

As you can see from the song titles, Circus is sort of a concept album, but in a very loose sense. The lyrics use various circus metaphors to convey all sorts of points ("I'm on a highwire, baby, moving far above the ground... I'm on a wheel of fire, spilling my breath into the ground..."), and the music, as far as I can tell, features no circus-related themes whatsoever. If you are nervous about the prospect of hearing a bunch of «creative variations» on ʽEntry Of The Gladiatorsʼ, be relieved — these songs have no comic overtones, most of this stuff is grimly serious, but not tre­mendously convoluted progressive rock.

With Ballard's testosterone-drenched rock anthems out of the picture, something had to take their place, and the band finds new inspiration in the world of «art-funk» and even «jazz fusion». Both of the long epic pieces, ʽHighwireʼ and ʽTrapezeʼ, particularly the latter (ʽHighwireʼ is still more of a «symph-prog» composition overall), feature lots of syncopated bass, fusion piano, and even shredding-type guitar solos from the new guitarists — all sorts of stuff that one can see, for in­stance, on contemporary Soft Machine albums.

Both compositions suffer from clumsy, cluttered structuring and lack of individual identity: there are instrumental passages that resemble each other more than they should, and if the band actually decided to stick them together as one eight­een minute-long composition, I'm sure nobody would really mind. But it would be a fun eighteen minute-long composition. The vocal melodies are original and sometimes even catchy, Rod plays everything in sight — electric pianos, organs, Mellotrons, synthesizers — and some of these guitar solos are damn, damn good. And the circus metaphors add a little bit of purpose: you don't get to perceive the tracks as «just» lengthy fusion jams. The instrumental battles sort of symbolize the ongoing battle of life the same way as the «highwire» and «trapeze» metaphors. Ah well.

Of the shorter songs, ʽClownʼ is a serious highlight — a solemn ballad that returns us to Argent's baroque pop sensibilities; although its main leading arpeggiated piano line is rather generic, the whole combination (majestic piano, gorgeous vocal part, «heavenly» harmonies, psycho-fusion-esque synth solo, etc.) works very well. And yes, the clown is sad. If there is any sort of a humo­rous relief on the entire record, it only comes at the end — ʽThe Jesterʼ is a bouncy, light, but «progressified» music-hall number whose merry piano-banging is only slightly offset by the ac­companying «astral» synth parts and a brief, sharp blues-rock solo.

All said, the simple music lover inside myself still regards the only «non-circus» track on the record, the lovely-lovely ballad ʽShine On Sunshineʼ, as its highest point — one of the greatest McCartney piano ballads that McCartney never wrote. Peaceful, humble, memorable, and the falsetto harmonies are killer. The fact that even Rod himself must have regarded it as one of his finest creations has now been directly confirmed by the re-recording with Colin Blunstone on vocals on the latest «Zombies reunion» album — a recording vastly inferior to the original, strip­ped almost completely of its warm, cuddly charm. By all means, seek out the old version with Rod himself on vocals: the masterpiece.

Summing up, Circus shows that the band did get up on its feet after the loss of Ballard. The fact that it did not last too long on those feet has everything to do with technical matters — lack of promotion, decrease of demand for that kind of music, an intentionally anti-commercial stand — and almost nothing to do with the quality of the music. Except that, as each and every Argent al­bum, Circus is not tremendously original, and, as usual, you can get all of its separate elements (Yes-like symph-prog, Soft Machine-like fusion, McCartney-like balladry, etc.) in various better known, better promoted, and, let's admit it, usually better executed packages. But in some res­pects, it is still a unique synthesis, fully deserving of a thumbs up.

The Beatles: Past Masters Vol. 1

THE BEATLES: PAST MASTERS, VOL. 1 (1962-1965; 1988)

1) Love Me Do; 2) From Me To You; 3) Thank You Girl; 4) She Loves You; 5) I'll Get You; 6) I Want To Hold Your Hand; 7) This Boy; 8) Komm, Gib Mir Deine Hand; 9) Sie Liebt Dich; 10) Long Tall Sally; 11) I Call Your Name; 12) Slow Down; 13) Matchbox; 14) I Feel Fine; 15) She's A Woman; 16) Bad Boy; 17) Yes It Is; 18) I'm Down.

In the CD age, one way to treat the Beatles' extensive singles catalog could have been to scatter it as bonus tracks tacked on to contemporary LP releases. On a certain level, that would have wor­ked well, because the singles frequently shared the same spirit as the LPs. Clearly, ʽWe Can Work It Outʼ is very much a Rubber Soul-type song, ʽPaperback Writerʼ embraces Revolver, and ʽHey Judeʼ is every bit as 1968-ish as The White Album.

Since the Beatles had, from the very beginning, enacted a very strict «no-filler» policy, they never shared the «save the best stuff for the singles, use the worst stuff to pad out the LPs» ideology that plagued the record industry all the way up to the «concept album» revolution. Instead, the singles were tasty trailers — in­sightful previews of things to come that were every bit as good as the things to come themselves, only shorter. ʽStrawberry Fields Foreverʼ left your head spinning, but it also left you craving for more, and somehow, you knew more was coming.

On the other hand, bonus tracks are all right, but a proper chronological sequencing of all the of­ficially released non-LP material may be even more right. The release of Past Masters way back in 1988 was probably the first time in history when a major band's «odds and ends» were treated with equal respect to the band itself and its fans: for comparison, no such comfortable collection has so far been made available for The Rolling Stones. And it gives you one more chance to wit­ness, this time in a brief, condensed, but equally «legitimate» version, the band's amazing deve­lopment from teen pop fakirs to seasoned magicians. These songs are every bit as good as LP ma­terial, and in quite a few cases, better; fossilizing them as «bonus» additions would be a psycho­logical disservice to the listener.

Vol. 1 is, expectedly, slightly less revered than Vol. 2, since it only manages to cover the band's early period — right up to Help!, stopping short at the breakpoint after which the Beatles would begin to regard themselves as superheroes and, consequently, act like ones. But that should not imply that the songs are in any way inferior to LP material from 1963-65. ʽFrom Me To Youʼ, ʽShe Loves Youʼ, ʽI Want To Hold Your Handʼ and, a bit apart chronologically and stylistically, ʽI Feel Fineʼ rank among the greatest A-sides ever released in the era when rock'n'roll was young, innocent, stylish, and British. Do I need to write about them? Probably not.

Ah, but what about ʽI Feel Fineʼ and its allegedly pioneering use of feedback on record? Pete Townshend used to scoff at that, claiming that The Who had already become good friends with manually controlled feedback by then — unfortunately, The Who never got around to recording their first feedback-containing singles until 1965, so, as far as I know, Liverpool still holds the trophy here. What is more important from a non-historical standpoint is that the single feedback note gives the song an odd shade of «rough mystery». Let's face it, it is somewhat monotonous, what with that cool, but repetitive riff dominating the entire song, and there's nothing like a sharp twaaaaang of feedback to set up an intriguing start.

But enough about the big ones. Most of the rest of the tracks are B-sides and EP material that was previously available on the old Rarities LP, which the regular average fan never bought — de­priving himself of a wealth of beautiful material. Well, not all of it is equally beautiful. The Ger­man versions of ʽShe Loves Youʼ and ʽI Want To Hold Your Handʼ are sheer novelties that do not even let you properly ridicule the boys' accents due to harmony singing and echo. That the Beatles, too, had to undergo the humiliating ritual of recording in a poorly mastered foreign lan­guage «to capture an overseas market», like so many of their peers, says a lot about the record in­dustry, but does not add much to one's respect for the band.

The EP Long Tall Sally from mid-1964 is hardly a major conquest in Beatles history either, but it does feature some of their most inventive cover versions. The title track is such a stone cold Little Richard classic that I cannot bring myself to asserting that the Beatles did it better: it is a milestone in the «McCartney Screams» saga (supposedly, it was John who goaded Paul into gi­ving it his all, convincing him that he could yell it out along with the best of 'em), but still, Paul McCartney is no Richard Penniman when it comes to revving up the larynx.

But all three covers (Little Richard's ʽLong Tall Sallyʼ, Carl Perkins' ʽMatchboxʼ, and Larry Williams' ʽSlow Downʼ) share the same advantage: they take basic rock'n'roll numbers that used to be pure entertainment, albeit with a naughty subtext, and add an odd pinch of desperation, at times descending into sheer madness. When Larry Williams sang ʽSlow Downʼ, it was fun. When Lennon took the lead, it turned into an open-text anthem of acute sexual hunger. ʽLong Tall Sal­lyʼ is screamed out by Paul at the top of his screaming range — yes, it is shakier and shallower than Little Richard's version, but way more hysterical. Coupled with George's equally hysterical guitar leads, it turns the band's take on the song into their wildest bit of «outside» rock'n'roll ever. Even ʽMatchboxʼ, given over to Ringo whose «range» is non-existent in principle, gets a slightly apocalyptic gloss with its echo effects over everything and double-tracked vocals. Funny, only the sole original on the EP, John's ʽI Call Your Nameʼ, remains completely hysteria-free — it is set in John's «chivalrous» mode (compare ʽAll I've Gotta Doʼ or ʽAnytime At Allʼ), even if the lyrics are about separation and longing, and is of a completely Hard Day's Night caliber.

Then there are the B-sides. Personal favs here would include ʽI'll Get Youʼ, one of their best ear­ly «kiddie love songs» (I've always loved the way its vocal melody unfurls without a single glitch from the opening "oh yeahs" to the chorus), and, naturally, ʽThis Boyʼ, arguably the greatest B-side from the band's early period — if only for its mid-section, where the intensity of John's vocal performance would not be truly matched again until... well, for quite some time.

I have to admit that ʽYes It Isʼ has always been too slow moving for me to enjoy it fully — even though I also admit that the song, solemnly dirge-like as it is, would not really work at any other tempo, and that in terms of depth of sentiment, it beats ʽBaby's In Blackʼ all to hell. It's also in­triguing: is it just about trying to pull oneself together after a breakup, or is she dead? Is it a song about a dead loved one? Could it be?...

I also have to admit that ʽI'm Downʼ has always seemed way too much of a self-penned Little Richard imitation/tribute for me to enjoy it fully — even if, technically, it is one of those classic McCartney rock'n'roll numbers. In reality, though, it is a hybrid. Behind all the rock'n'roll screa­ming and Harrison's stinging leads lies a classic pop chorus, seeking its strength in vocal harmo­nies. I mean, the song is bluesy and all, but the chorus really belongs in the ʽPlease Please Meʼ ballpark, doesn't it? Not even sure if Paul ever wrote one wholesome «non-pop» rocker in his life. Not that it's a big problem or anything. But in between ʽI'm Downʼ and John's cover of Larry Williams' ʽBad Boyʼ — two of their loudest tracks from early 1965 — I always found myself veering towards the latter if there was any frustration to be vented.

Actually, it is kind of a funny thing: with the Stones on their heels, the Beatles never laid a claim to the title of «bad boys of rock'n'roll», yet there still is a very small handful of titles in their catalog where John's mean, aggressive side comes out with a vengeance — you know that at moments like these, he'd be beating poor little Mick to a pulp in his corner. I sometimes think that when he was recording ʽBad Boyʼ, he simply let that nasty 15-year old Liverpudlian hooligan re­inhabit his body once again — that, despite the lack of personal authorship and the essentially comic lyrics, he felt some sort of intimate bond here, almost to the point of making a pledge to turn this humorous number into something much more dark and troublesome. Maybe it is not a complete success (it is very hard to intensify and terror-ify songs that were originally conceived as comic parodies), but the very fact that, for instance, the cover version omits kooky backing vocals ("he's a... bad boy") that accompany each line of the original, supports my point.

Anyway, altogether I would say that the ratio of good-to-great titles on Vol. 1 is more or less con­sistent with the band's normal LP ratios from 1963-64; omit the German versions and the in­teresting, but rather useless alternate single version of ʽLove Me Doʼ (with session drummer An­dy White replacing Ringo on a rather pointless whim from George Martin), and you just got your­self another high-level early Beatles album. Congratulations.

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Blind Lemon Jefferson: Complete Recording Sessions Vol. 4

BLIND LEMON JEFFERSON: COMPLETE RECORDED WORKS, VOL. 4 (1929)

1) Eagle Eyed Mama; 2) Dynamite Blues; 3) Disgusted Blues  ; 4) Competition Bed Blues; 5) Sad News Blues; 6) Peach Orchard Blues; 7) Oil Well Blues; 8) Tin Cup Blues; 9) Big Night Blues; 10) Empty House Blues; 11) Sa­tur­day Night Spender Blues; 12) That Black Snake Moan No. 2; 13) Bed Springs Blues; 14) Yo Yo Blues; 15) Mos­qui­to Moan; 16) Southern Woman Blues; 17) Bakershop Blues; 18) Pneumonia Blues; 19) Long Distance Moan; 20) That Crawlin' Baby Blues; 21) Fence Breakin' Yellin' Blues; 22) Cat Man Blues; 23) The Cheaters Spell; 24) Bootin' Me 'Bout.

It would be nice to be able to say that Blind Lemon managed to «rebound» in the last year of his life, but he didn't. Most of these recordings are slow, steady, relatively formulaic blues pieces that focus on the man's singing rather than playing. Only once, towards the very very end, does he all of a sudden remember the way it used to be — ʽThat Crawlin' Baby Bluesʼ is a merry-rollickin' series of guitar fireworks, almost up to the standarts of ʽRabbit Foot Bluesʼ, played with plenty of fire and abandon. Which makes the context look even more strange, proving that the man did not «forget» how to be amazing, but really, truly, consciously chose not to.

The rest of the recordings range from very simple and feeble-sounding performances (ʽEagle Eyed Mamaʼ) to slightly more inventive, but monotonous (ʽDynamite Bluesʼ, built on a series of pretty flourishes that all sound the same, gruesomely discrediting the title), to occasional slow-growers (ʽBed Spring Bluesʼ, strummed quietly and lazily, but in reality with lots of interesting chord changes that require pressing your ear close to the speaker). On the lyrical side, there is a clear tendency to emphasize «dirty» subjects and double entendres — a tendency that, oddly enough, is frequently noticeable among pre-war blues-rockers as they grow in fame and fortune... somebody should probably inform Mick Jagger.

Blind Lemon's last session was held on September 24, 1929 – exactly one month prior to «Black Thursday»; Blind Lemon's death date is usually listed as December 19, 1929. No, he didn't die of a heart attack because his stocks were lost; the most likely version is that he froze to death, being lost in a snowstorm – drunk, presumably? In any case, it is somewhat telling that he never sur­vived into the Depression era, missing the chance to become one of its great bards, like Charlie Patton. These recordings from 1928-29 clearly see him veering further and further into «urban­ized» territory, a safer and quieter harbor, moderately attractive for conservatively minded black and white audiences alike.

And there is nothing wrong with that — except that this move to «higher ground» almost cost the man his integrity. Chances are, had he survived into the 1930s or even later, his early records would be regarded as somewhat of a «crazy anomaly», created in his younger, reckless, wildest days. (Actually, something similar would happen to Big Bill Broonzy, whose earliest records are also his most interesting from a technical standpoint). As it is, we have a fifty-fifty type of pro­portion, and it is not surprising that most of the compilations prefer to focus on the first fifty: Ya­zoo's The Best Of features 17 selections from 1925-27, 4 dated 1928, and only 2 dated 1929. I totally agree with that ratio.

The Books: The Way Out

THE BOOKS: THE WAY OUT (2010)

1) Group Autogenics I; 2) IDKT; 3) I Didn't Know That; 4) A Cold Freezin' Night; 5) Beautiful People; 6) I Am Who I Am; 7) Chain Of Missing Links; 8) All You Need Is A Wall; 9) Thirty Incoming; 10) A Wonderful Phrase By Gandhi; 11) We Bought The Flood; 12) The Story Of Hip Hop; 13) Free Translator; 14) Group Autogenics II.

Question: so why exactly did The Books break up? Answer: why, cuz the darn kids just don't read 'em no more these days! In this sad, illiterate age, plagued by free porn and Angry Birds...

...oops, sorry, wrong platform. The correct answer, of course, is: because so few people really cared if they lived or died that they preferred to die. For publicity's sake, I assume. «The Books broke up today». «What are you talking about? I only just finished rearranging the shelves». «No, apparently there was a whole band out there, called The Books, and they just broke up.» «Whoah, you don't say? A band called The Books? Why didn't anybody tell me? What's their game? Where can I buy their records? Do they offer a last minute garage sale? Is the fan club offering T-shirts for free?»

Not sure about T-shirts, but at least the band went out with its most transparently «musical» al­bum ever. Ironically, it is also their one record that is the least dependent on their traditional brands of instrumentation. Most of the backing tracks are either electronic or R'n'B-ish, or both, with the emphasis no longer on guitar and cello. This is not necessarily a plus in itself, but it makes the record more dynamic and jerky, so at the very least it is not that easy to fall asleep to the individual tracks.

Moving on, the album, for the first time ever, somehow tries to explain itself to the befuddled lis­tener. "Hello, greetings and welcome. Welcome to a new beginning, for this tape will serve you as a new beginning... On this recording, music specifically created for its pleasurable effects upon your mind, body and emotions is mixed with a warm orange colored liquid. Your body is now a glass container". If you have already signed a written consent allowing your body to be treated as a glass container, who knows? — your mind, body and emotions might even consider The Way Out an introspective masterpiece.

Or «outrospective», whatever. The herky-jerky nature of these tunes produces a paranoid impres­sion, which is way better than a lethargic impression. ʽI Didn't Know Thatʼ sounds like a shred­ded and recycled hip-hop (or would that be trip-hop?) track with a free jazz flavor for good mea­sure. ʽA Cold Freezin' Nightʼ features a little boy threatening to blow your brains out to the mer­ry sounds of something in between a robotic electro-funk pattern and a video game soundtrack. ʽI Am Who I Amʼ tips its hat to industrial metal (soft, though) as the protagonist asserts his identity ("I will be who I am and what I am"). And so on — do I really need to go through all the tracks?

Actually, a couple of the tracks almost work as actual songs. ʽAll You Need Is A Wallʼ is a rare spot of quiet acoustic meditation and falsetto vocal harmonies; and ʽFree Translatorʼ is an acous­tic folk composition, plain and simple. Neither of the tunes is particularly memorable or original, but at least The Books leave you unable to say: «These guys never made an actual song in their entire life». Although, come to think of it, it would sound cool, especially considering that they are much better at collages anyway.

In the end, I would probably have given the whole thing the usual negative assessment, if it weren't for ʽThe Story Of Hip-Hopʼ, a track that lambasts the genre in the subtlest way possible — as actual hip-hop samples are mixed in with a steadier rhythm track, «disrupting the flow» of the whole thing every several seconds, someone narrates «the story of Hip-Hop» as an animate character, including smart observations about the latter, such as "He never rests. He beats and whirrs and whirrs so fast that you can't tell what he looks like". And the moral at the end: "Now you see the trouble little Hip Hop got into. It was all because he didn't look where he hopped..." Hey, could I take credit for that? Guess not. Too bad.

So, The Way Out is not a particularly bad way out for these guys. If their purpose in art was to confuse and derail, I must say this is the only record in the catalog that seems to me to have hit at least somewhere near that mark. Occasionally intriguing, occasionally funny, rarely boring, fea­turing ʽA Wonderful Phrase By Gandhiʼ, and lots and lots and lots of «original» text that I very much want to see as a parody on spiritual sermons than the real thing (ʽChain Of Missing Linksʼ is pretty much the apogee here). It's okay. I just hope these guys never come together again. Out is out, after all. It isn't nice to cheat.

Ash: A-Z Vol. 2

ASH: A-Z VOL. 2 (2010)

1) Dare To Dream; 2) Mind Control; 3) Insects; 4) Binary; 5) Physical World; 6) Spheres; 7) Instinct; 8) Summer Snow; 9) Carnal Love; 10) Embers; 11) Change Your Name; 12) Sky Burial; 13) There Is Hope Again; 14) Teenage Wildlife; 15) Spellbound; 16) Nightfall.

The second volume in the series seems slightly less engaging than the first. There is a little bit more electronics, a little bit less hooks, and a nagging feeling that this formula simply cannot go on forever, or, at least, that the English alphabet simply has too many letters in it to adequately fit Tim Wheeler's purposes. But overall, if you already own — and like — the first half of the series, there is no reason not to own and like the second half.

The review will be brief, because most of the general remarks have already been made for Vol. 1, and specific remarks are hard to come by — this is Ash, after all, not the Beach Boys or the Beatles, there is not a lot to latch onto. Catchiest tunes so far are ʽPhysical Worldʼ, one of their trademark fast-paced pop-punk ravers with a message we can all identify with: ("Come back to the physical world, you're lost in the digital world" — tell me about it); ʽInstinctʼ, whose lyrics ("I'm animal, I'm not machine") strangely contrast with heavy use of Cold Synth Harbor; and the anthemic six-minute performance of ʽTeenage Wildlifeʼ, a great, inspiring tune if there ever was one... oh wait, it's a David Bowie song. Bummer.

I have to admit that even the electronic dance stuff is sometimes linked to vocal hooks the likes of which this band rarely, if ever, knew before. There is nothing surprising or particularly likeable about the likes of ʽBinaryʼ, but the chorus truly sounds amazing, with a set of "alright, alright"s in the background that can even remedy a sinking mood — try it out. On the other hand, their at­tempts at mimicking the Arcade Fire sound do not work so well: ʽDare To Dreamʼ builds up a wall of sound all right, but Arcade Fire, at their best, make the song sound big/sprawling/anthe­mic and personal/confessional at the same time. Wheeler, on the other hand, manages the spraw­ling thing well enough, but there's nothing intimate about it.

Arguably the best thing on the entire record, however, is ʽSky Burialʼ — in fact, it might just be the most daring thing Ash ever attempted in their lifetime, and they get away with it: a ten-minute long, almost «progressive», instrumental whose purpose it is to take you to the skies (don't really know about the burial, though — there is nothing funebral here whatsoever). A ten-minute «jam» like that from a band known for its generic alt-rock inclinations should be awful, but this isn't really a jam: it's a well-structured, progressively developing composition, moving along at a brisk, energetic pace (apart from a slowed down, minimalistic-atmospheric midsection), alternating riffs, trills, pretty slide guitar trips, bombastic power sections, wailing blues-rock solos, and a big wah-wah fury in the final section.

The whole thing arrives completely unexpected: you don't normally expect a lack of vocals or a ten-minute length on a single, and Ash are not usually known for taking these sorts of risks. I am not even sure that I really like it so much on its own, not simply for the reason that it stands out so much. But more likely, it just confirms the old suspicion once again: in a different age, Tim Wheeler would not have been saddled with bland mainstream «rock» conventions of his era, and could be continuously doing stuff like that — painting complex semi-psychedelic pictures that begin in Allman Brothers territory and end up on Hawkwind turf. It would have been derivative and not always amazing, but it could have been consistently entertaining. In any case, I am glad that this whole «singles» idea worked, and that, somehow, it gave the band a chance to stretch out and do stuff beyond their usual image. Thumbs up, and it would be curious to know where they will be headed from here in the future: for the next two years, Wheeler kept a fairly low profile.

Aztec Camera: High Land, Hard Rain

AZTEC CAMERA: HIGH LAND, HARD RAIN (1983)

1) Oblivious; 2) The Boy Wonders; 3) Walk Out To Winter; 4) The Bugle Sounds Again; 5) We Could Send Letters; 6) Pillar To Post; 7) Release; 8) Lost Outside The Tunnel; 9) Back On Board; 10) Down The Dip; 11*) Haywire; 12*) Orchid Girl; 13*) Queen's Tattoos.

Every time I listen to New Wave pop from the early 1980s, all these fresh new faces wishing to leave their mark on musical history and all, I can't help wondering whether all that stuff would be more enjoyable without all the electronics. Leave in the smarter brands of lyrics, the R'n'B, reggae, and «world music» influences, the commercial hooks, but leave out the digitalization — would that make the songs more durable and intelligent-sounding?

Well, look no further than the Aztec Camera debut record to answer that question. The opening track, ʽObliviousʼ, greets you with a funky drum beat rather typical of the time — but the rhythm part is pure acoustic guitar, and, apart from a thin electric organ part that comes in later, that's all the instrumentation you get. A danceable pop song composed and performed in a contemporary manner, but rigorously set to a stark acoustic guitar backing — who else did that in 1983? Mind you, we are not talking «college rock» à la R.E.M. here: Roddy Frame, the 19-year old Scottish mastermind behind Aztec Camera, was clearly aiming for the charts.

And ʽObliviousʼ did hit the UK charts, eventually going as high as #18, which is fairly high for an acoustic pop hit at the time. But then again, it's not just the instrumentation. It's Roddy's voice — free of mannerisms or extra pathos; Roddy's lyrics — freshly intricate and thought-provoking in the verses ("they'll call us lonely when we're really just alone" is quite a nice line), seductively straightforward in the chorus; Roddy's hooks — the chorus has just enough chord changes and is reprised just the exact number of times to stick firmly. It's not a jaw-droppingly great song, but it oozes quality and inspiration all over, and it is particularly excellent in a 1983 context.

Acoustic guitar is not the only leading instrument on Aztec Camera's debut, but the only other leading instrument is the electric guitar, and I have only been able to spot electronic percussion ef­fects in a few places where they never spoil the impression. As for the music, Roddy does not subscribe fully to the «new school» of musical thought. He is clearly influenced just as much by the likes of Phil Spector (check out the «wall-of-sound» chorus on ʽWe Could Send Lettersʼ), smooth jazz (ʽReleaseʼ), even gospel-tinged R'n'B (ʽBack On Boardʼ), not to mention just about every school of pop from the Beatles to ABBA.

The only thing that prevents High Land from reaching «total masterpiece» status is a certain mo­notonousness in the arrangements. It is nice that Roddy and his backers can install the wall-of-sound with just a bunch of acoustic guitars and a few harmony overdubs, but overall, the minima­listic approach to arrangements gets a bit samey: at the very least, it prevents the listener from immediately dropping down dead in amazement — you have to let the songs gradually establish their individuality, get used to the difference in messages and atmospheres that is conveyed most­ly through different chord structures.

But when you do, the album can overwhelm you with a wow!-effect when you least expect it, be­cause the songs are worth it. "Walk out to winter, swear I'll be there" is tremendously uplifting and chivalrous without fake sentimentality. ʽThe Bugle Sounds Againʼ uses a clever military me­taphor and ironically-pathetic martial atmosphere, influenced by Scottish folk, to talk about good old love some more. The "Once I was happy in happy extremes..." chorus of ʽPillar To Postʼ ea­sily matches the emotional impact of any of Elvis Costello's greatest songs (not to mention that Roddy has an advantage here — no one has to undergo the fussy procedure of getting used to the pitch and tone of his voice).

The whole thing is wildly optimistic in spirit: no syrup and a constant readiness to confess pro­blems and pain, but always with hopes of redemption and an outlook to a better future. Every­thing sounds intelligent and sincere, including the more intimate songs like ʽReleaseʼ where Rod­dy complains that "I wanted the world, and all I could get to was a gun or a girl" — yes, its past tense is almost believable, despite the guy being all of 19 years old at the time (and the song may have been composed even earlier: Aztec Camera released their first single when he was 16). The album itself, having started out with a fully rhythmic pop hit, ends on a humble note with just Roddy and his guitar, trying out a simple folk ditty (ʽDown The Dipʼ) that's equal parts Bob Dy­lan and Willie Nelson. "I put all the love and beauty in the spirit of the night / And I'm holding my ticket tight / Stupidity and suffering are on that ticket, too / And I'm going down the dip with you" is a chorus I like so much I even took the time to retype it.

It is this combination of intelligence and optimism that distinguishes High Land from so much dreck around it — intelligent songwriters at the time tended to veer towards bleakness and depre­s­sion, leaving hope and romance for commercial hacks. Roddy Frame was one of the few excep­tions who tried to kick the ground from under the feet of commercial hacks, beating them at their own game. He did not succeed, but the legacy of High Land is one of those blessings that helps seek out and destroy stereotypes. As far as I'm concerned, the album should be in any «Top 20» for 1983, and even higher if we want the list to be maximally diverse. And a respectable / admi­ring thumbs up from both sides of human nature.

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Bad Company: Rough Diamonds

BAD COMPANY: ROUGH DIAMONDS (1982)

1) Electricland; 2) Untie The Knot; 3) Nuthin' On The TV; 4) Painted Face; 5) Kickdown; 6) Ballad Of The Band; 7) Cross Country Boy; 8) Old Mexico; 9) Downhill Ryder; 10) Racetrack.

A completely misguided, fatal failure here. Apparently, the band was not «feeling well» in the ear­ly 1980s, due to personal problems, exhaustion, and, according to some sources, a certain dis­appointment in their image and the whole rock star thing, brought on by the deaths of labelmate John Bonham and soulmate (you wish) John Lennon. Thus, following up on their hearts' desires, they decided to make a more «personal», «darker» record than usual.

They forgot one important thing, though: dark and personal albums absolutely require musical genius in order to make their point. Just to select a few minor chords, sew them up in a traditio­nally honored way, and let Paul Rodgers take care of the rest won't do. But that is exactly how the band preferred  to behave anyway, dumping most of their «conquests» on Desolation Angels — all the disco and New Wave influences — in favor of the good old brand, without any interesting riffs but with a lot of feeling. Paul Rodgers isn't feeling too good, and he wants you to tear your sorry little ass out of the embraces of Thriller and know it. Obey!

Okay, it isn't really that gloomy. Actually, the album does veer between the usual mid-tempo not-so-hard-rock in the pangs of depression, and a set of cheerier, more evidently danceable R'n'B numbers with heavy emphasis on saxophone support, provided by guest star and one-time Boz Burrell's colleague in King Crimson, Mel Collins. On any other album most of these numbers would just look stupid, but here, stuff like ʽBallad Of The Bandʼ is at least a temporary respite from hearing Rodgers complain about life's treachery on interchangeable dreck like ʽKickdownʼ and ʽElectriclandʼ. (Yes, the former is a sincere lament built upon horror brought on by the Len­non murder. No, it isn't a good song at all. The very fact of Lennon's death did not exactly set off an extra wave of genius inspiration in people).

For objectivity's sakes, I can list a few scraps of relative goodness. John Cook's piano intro to ʽCross Country Boyʼ (apparently three or four seconds out of one hundred and seventy). The dumb, but sticky five-note riff in ʽDownhill Ryderʼ (but why the ʽyʼ?). Mick Ralphs' excellent slide guitar part on ʽRaceʼ — a last-moment set of gorgeously strung chords, totally wasted in the context of an otherwise pedestrian song on an otherwise pedestrian album. Not much, eh?

All right: for total objectivity, I must say that the overall sound of Rough Diamonds is fairly decent for a 1982 album. The new style of mainstream-oriented production had not yet taken over fully, and electronic support is used quite sparingly: a few synth parts here and there, but no at­tempt to let the robots take over the real men. On the other hand, in 1982 this couldn't be quali­fied as a brave, integrity-boosting artistic move. It just meant the new standards hadn't yet been fully established. By 1986, the band would catch on. In short, nothing saves Rough Diamonds from a predictable thumbs down — not even the fact that ʽElectriclandʼ scored relatively well on the single charts. Everything that had to do with Lennon's death scored well on the charts, so it doesn't really count.

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Argent: Encore

ARGENT: ENCORE (1974)

1) The Coming Of Kohoutek; 2) It's Only Money (part 1); 3) It's Only Money (part 2); 4) God Gave Rock And Roll To You; 5) Thunder And Lightning; 6) Music From The Spheres; 7) I Don't Believe In Miracles; 8) I Am The Dance Of Ages; 9) Keep On Rollin'; 10) Hold Your Head Up; 11) Time Of The Season.

This seems to have mostly been a «stopgap» record — a live album released to keep the record company happy while the band was regrouping after the loss of Ballard. But since Argent was, after all, a «prog»-type outfit, and the live album was appropriately double, the whole thing was very much in the spirit of the time. Perhaps, were Argent on the same scale of notoriety as Yes and ELP, they would have been allowed a triple format?

The setlist here concentrates almost exclusively on three of the band's latest albums, completely ignoring Argent and Ring Of Hands — and generally concentrating on the longest, loudest, and most pompous of the band's compositions, downplaying their «poppier» side. In this context, the weak, unconvincing call of «let's get it on and boogie!» that rings out towards the end of the set, with ʽKeep On Rollinʼ, is a relative disappointment, even though Ballard throws on a frantic Chuck Berry-style guitar solo that the original studio version never knew. It's one of these tri­butary ges­tures that way too many «artsy» bands of the 1970s engaged in, just to show the world that they never hung up their rock'n'roll shoes, and it was almost never credible, regardless of whether it came from good bands like ELO or horrible ones like Uriah Heep.

On the other hand, credible or not, five minutes of basic rock'n'roll can still work as a brainchar­mer after three full sides of heavy and/or symphonic art-rock showpieces. And it may not sound nice, but Rod is simply not a very interesting live player. In the studio, it is his compositions, sense of taste, and overall creativity that has always attracted me over Ballard's; but live, it is the Russ show all the way as long as Russ is on that way. ʽThe Coming Of Kohoutekʼ remains faith­ful to the original and nothing more; but ʽMusic From The Spheresʼ, for instance, is hopelessly spoiled by the band's inability to recreate the «cosmic kaleidoscope» of sounds in the coda — Ballard sets a thick, effects-laden guitar tone that smears the whole feeling, and Rod's keyboards are lost in the background.

ʽI Am The Dance Of Agesʼ and ʽHold Your Head Upʼ are both extended with lengthy solo parts, played consecutively on Rod's array of Mellotrons, Hammonds, and Moogs. Neither of these parts is particularly inspiring: perhaps they should have left the extra space for ʽBe Gladʼ or a couple more heavy guitar rockers like ʽBe My Loverʼ. Thus, it's up to Ballard to keep the energy flowing on ʽIt's Only Moneyʼ and ʽThunder And Lightningʼ. For the record, he also performs a non-Argent song: ʽI Don't Believe In Miraclesʼ, a soft-rock hit he wrote for Colin Blunstone's Ennismore album from 1972. It isn't very good. Too much pathos set to weak hooks.

You'd think that, perhaps, in order to heat up the public interest, Argent would agree to perfor­ming a good deal of old Zombies material — at least the real old hits like ʽShe's Not Thereʼ, stuff that certainly wasn't considered «dead and gone» by the mid-Seventies. But the only Zombies song here is ʽTime Of The Seasonʼ, recast in a hard-rocking mood, with a lengthy screeching gui­tar intro and a very rough coating, compared to the smooth studio original. They do it as the final encore — implying that, perhaps, quite a few people came to the show in hopes of hearing it — but that's the only nod to any kind of past that precedes 1972.

Which is too bad, because it means that Encore, Argent's only official live document, does not provide a comprehensive picture of the band — they were more than creators of lengthy second-hand instrumental suites and sprawling heavy rock anthems; their pop sensibility, one of their strongest sides, remains almost completely unseen. Encore deserves to be heard — the songs are good, the performances aren't rote — and so it gets a thumbs up, but there's no rush. This is not one of the decade's great live art-rock albums, like Yessongs or Jethro Tull's Burstin' Out. It is merely admirable for showing how a band that is clearly more comfortable in the studio can still honestly get away with giving a good time to a live audience.

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The Beatles: Abbey Road

THE BEATLES: ABBEY ROAD (1969)

1) Come Together; 2) Something; 3) Maxwell's Silver Hammer; 4) Oh! Darling; 5) Octopus' Garden; 6) I Want You (She's So Heavy); 7) Here Comes The Sun; 8) Because; 9) You Never Give Me Your Money; 10) Sun King; 11) Mean Mr. Mustard; 12) Polythene Pam; 13) She Came In Through The Bathroom Window; 14) Golden Slumbers; 15) Carry That Weight; 16) The End; 17) Her Majesty.

To say that Abbey Road sounds like no other album ever recorded is to say nothing. What is real­ly important is that Abbey Road sounds like no other Beatles album ever recorded. Within the confines of the large world that is the Beatles, Abbey Road is a sub-world in itself; a musical mystery that was supposed to put a full stop to the Beatles career — then subtly replaced it with an ellipsis. It's an open-invitation album: «Terribly sorry, guys, for having to leave you so soon, but, in compensation, we'll just give you this cool idea you could perhaps expand upon some time in the future... and this one... and one more... and another bunch... and this... and this...»

It so happened that I came into first contact with Abbey Road at a somewhat later date, after I'd already heard and properly assimilated the rest of the Beatles' regular catalog. I remember that first feeling — what I heard that day struck me as the product of an entirely different band. It was the Beatles for sure, and at the same time, it was a different Beatles. I wasn't even sure I «loved» those Beatles to the same extent I «loved» the normal Beatles. It didn't feel like a musical piece that was supposed to be «loved». It had a mythological aura around it. It was part-time scary, part-time disorienting, part-time religiously beautiful. You couldn't make friends with that record like you could make friends with The White Album. You couldn't understand how in the world did they manage something like that. Years later, I still cannot put it into context. There is not a single thing about Abbey Road that would scream out 1969.

I understand now that it certainly had to take the traumatic effects of January 1969 to bring out this side of the band. The individual Beatles generally acknowledge that they went into the Abbey Road studios one last time in the summer of 1969 feeling, or even knowing, without saying it, that this was going to be their «swan song», and this could not help but add extra solemnity and seri­ousness — that last chance had to be taken. But there's more to that. Compare the band's material on Abbey Road with the songs on their first — and generally best — solo albums, released with­in a year or so. These are great albums, but they are understandable: John's bleeding confessions, Paul's homespun absurdism and/or romance, George's straightforward search for the meaning of life (and, er, Ringo's «songs to keep Grandma happy»). Abbey Road, compared to these, opens the «doors of perception» to something entirely different, and I am not sure how to call it.

Let us take off from the obvious. First of all, Abbey Road is grim. The only song here that can be called relatively sunny and optimistic is ʽHere Comes The Sunʼ, and even that one works like a momentary consolation rather than an all-out idealistic anthem. Even Paul is bleak: his trademark studio silliness evolves into black humor on ʽMaxwell's Silver Hammerʼ (which some even find repulsive), and his sentimentalism into unhealthy hysteria on ʽOh! Darlingʼ. George's ʽSome­thingʼ, the album's one and only hardcore love ballad, alternates between devotion and paranoid fear. And John's songs... the beast was having a field day within him that summer.

Second, Abbey Road is distant. Most Beatles albums had their intimate or uniting moments, sucking in the individual guest or the collective host. Paul sweetly cooing along with an acoustic guitar. John letting you in on how he's so tired, he hasn't slept a wink. Friendly, inviting vaude­ville. Singalong choruses for family audiences. We all live in a yellow submarine, naaaah naaaah na-na-na-n-na and so on. There is nothing of the sort on Abbey Road. These songs are not made for «us»; they seem to be talking to somebody else out there, and you have no idea who. With a different band, this approach could infuriate; with the Beatles, it intrigues. There's an odd channel here that leads somewhere — I am still trying to figure it out.

This «distance» is perhaps best illustrated by one of my absolute favorite moments on the album — one that, for some reason, nobody ever talks about: the last minute of ʽYou Never Give Me Your Moneyʼ, that section where the repetitive "one two three four five six seven, all good chil­d­ren go to heaven" mantra kicks in. Before that section, the song is a mix of short, excellent musical ideas and understandable lyrical content; but once it begins, the combination of majestic arpeggiated riff, heavy wailing leads, and Paul's fear­some bass, gradually, softly giving way to a field of wind chimes and cicadas is simply some­thing else. It seems simple when disentangled and put on paper, but the real effect is undescri­bable. It's psychedelic, I guess, but it isn't your average psychedelia. There's some sort of loneli­ness here, a weird feeling of being stranded some­where in a whirl of alien happenings — nothing particularly threatening, more like a combination of «thoroughly uncongenial» with a sense of deep intelligence. Like you're encoun­te­ring new life forms that you really know nothing about, but still get a feeling they must be smarter than yourself.

Still, the words «dark» and «distant» do not suffice to properly describe the atmosphere of Abbey Road. If you just asked me to name the first «dark» and «distant» band that comes to mind, I'd probably go along with The Cure instead, and Abbey Road is nothing like The Cure. Thus, here is a third defining feature — well, you probably saw it coming — Abbey Road is cathartic. Its songs are either big and sprawling, or tense to the point of snapping, or calm and serene to the utmost, and it all comes together in a total emotional spectrum. The only one missing is hatred, but that is to be expected. Who'd expect to see hatred on the Beatles' last album?

Each of these songs — including even most of the little pieces in the large medley — deserves several pages of text, but overkill never helped anybody, so, instead, I will just jot down some random observations on stuff, beginning from the beginning and then proceeding in no particular order. Here goes...

The opening seconds. Chuck Berry could sue John for all he wanted to: ʽCome Togetherʼ may be loosely built around the chords of ʽYou Can't Catch Meʼ and even retweet the line about «old flattop», but otherwise, it's one of those cases where a borrowing of a bit of «form» adds a com­pletely new «spirit». John's «shooing» (allegedly he is supposed to say «shoot!», but I never get to hear anything except the first consonant), Paul's jumping bass pattern, and Ringo's soft, but stern «crescendo rolls» on the drums — weird combination, right? Every single Beatles album up to then would start out with a bang — a crashing power chord, a loud guitar riff, a snappy, ener­getic vocal lead, or some other musical sledgehammer. Abbey Road is the only one that starts out with an atmosphere of deep mystery instead. A sign of «maturity»?

ʽI Want Youʼ — too heavy, too scary, too bizarre to gain mass popularity, but is there another moment in the Beatles catalog where John's voice would match so closely the wobbling modula­tion of John's guitar? Some of these "I want you, I want you so bad" actually remind of his Yoko-fueled solo experiments (Two Virgins, Life With The Lions etc.), but, since this is a Beatles al­bum, the irrational primal energy here is properly harnessed and integrated into a «normal» musi­cal structure — which only adds memorability and further emotional impact. And even if, on the surface, the song is about going love-crazy (the Japanese curse strikes again!), it is also John's only truly ambiguous composition on the subject: the «horrific» "she's so heavy" part paints a picture of strolling through a barren wintery wasteland, knee-deep in the snow, with Abbey Road Studios' brand new synthesizers adding heavy white-noise wind support. I'm not exactly sure Yoko would harbor the same feelings for this song as she did for ʽOh My Loveʼ.

Probably the greatest mood transition between a Side A / Side B contrast on a Beatles album ever — especially today, when you no longer have to turn the record over manually. Just as the wind howling that winds around the doom-laden chords of ʽShe's So Heavyʼ reaches its peak, the tape is unexpectedly cut off — and replaced by the lightest, prettiest, folksiest acoustic pattern on the album. For me, this is the single greatest «musical relief» in LP history, as George comes along and literally tears the listener out of the dark wings of depression, Galadriel-fashion. As I already said, ʽHere Comes The Sunʼ is not a lot of relief: it is short, quiet, humble, and already ʽBecauseʼ returns us to slightly more troubled waters, but sometimes «a gleam of hope» on an album works more intensely, with a more profound and lasting effect, than a whole side of it.

People like to condemn ʽMaxwell's Silver Hammerʼ as just another silly piece of fluffy Paul crap. It is music-hall-ish enough, yes, and the lyrics are silly (and rather clumsy), but it fits the album's tenseness — hey, silly or not, Paul just wrote a song about a juvenile serial killer! — and it intro­duces the Moog synth into the Beatles' array of instruments just at the right moment. Old-time vaudeville performed on hyper-modern electronic gadgets? Count me in. It also adds up to the overall mystery feel of the album.

John sometimes used to say that ʽOh! Darlingʼ was a song on which Paul should have traded the lead vocal rights over to him — he may have been right, having honed the art of «passionate screaming» ever since the recording of ʽAnnaʼ way back in 1963, but Paul's lungs in 1969 were no slouch, either. The song may own a serious debt to classic R'n'B and Louisiana swamp pop, but the bridge section — Paul screaming it out like a psycho over George's razor-sharp electric chords — strictly follows the «Abbey Road spirit». Dangerous, brooding, distant. It is hardly a coincidence that both John's and Paul's love statements on Side A dump sentimentality, replacing it with madness and aggression.

That sort of leaves George to do the honors, but ʽSomethingʼ isn't really a «love song» per se, no matter what Frank S. might have to say about it (well, he used to introduce it as a «Lennon-Mc­Cartney» song, too). George himself never admitted personally that it was about Pattie, and some­thing tells me that his personal feelings for his wife in 1969 weren't really that deep to serve as chief inspiration. It's really a religious hymn, close in form and spirit to All Things Must Pass. And it isn't just sentimentally sweet: it swings from deep admiration ("something in the way she moves...") to nervous jealousy ("don't want to leave her now...") to almost aggressive insecurity (bridge section) — with what is probably George's best ever guitar solo going through all three of these states, one by one.

«Okay», says you, «but what about Ringo? Surely Ringo at least will be the one cheerful spirit in this morose bunch! He's singing about octopi — how can a song about octopi be dark and depres­sing?» Well, to each his own, but there must be a good reason why ʽOctopus's Gardenʼ is often considered the drummer's finest addition to the Beatles catalog — and to me, that reason has al­ways been the subtly sad emotional state it generates. The band helped Ringo shape the simple little kiddie tune into a sonic masterpiece — the harmonies, Lennon's jangly rhythm in the back, the «synth bubbles», everything combines to really make it sound like a trip through an imaginary underwater paradise — but the lyrics clearly state that "I'd like to be...", and Ringo, perhaps sub­consciously, sings it in such a longing manner that it is perfectly clear: the song is about some­thing positively unreachable. (Okay, so we all know that none of us has a chance to see a real Octopus's Garden any more than the stage set of ʽLucy In The Skyʼ, but that's the difference: ʽLu­cyʼ and other songs like it were psychedelic, implying that all these wonder-locations were per­fectly reachable inside your mind — maybe with a little help from your «friends» — but ʽGar­denʼ is a «fantasy» song, utterly non-psychedelic in spirit).

And where does that sadness reach its climax? In George's brief leads during the final chorus refrain. At 2:34-2:36 you get an outburst of anger, at 2:39-2:41 — an anguished wail. I have al­ways thought of these brief moments as the perfect way to blend the «lightness» of ʽOctopus's Gardenʼ into the immediately following «heaviness» of ʽI Want Youʼ (and, for that matter, the whole Side A has an amazing continuity and coherence to it, despite not being organized as a medley, but that would take too much space and time to explain).

And — about the medley. The opinion one usually gets on the medley is: «The Beatles had a lot of leftover fragments from past sessions, none of which worked well in and out of itself, so they threw them all together to prop up each other and came out with a masterpiece». This is probably correct, but it still requires understanding how the heck can a bunch of assorted odds and ends make up a masterpiece.

I think the medley should be thought of in terms of a «last gift». If the band subconsciously knew they were going out with this thing, it would have been natural for them to try and give it all they got — in particular, to somehow implement, at least briefly, every good idea they had stacked in the vaults (one reason, by the way, why ransacking the Abbey Road archives over the years has resulted in so few previously unreleased songs of any worth). It might have been possible to work all those little segments into three-minute long songs and sacrifice a few of the weaker ones — but it wouldn't have given the people so much. It also looks like a last-minute frantic competition be­tween John and Paul: in the main body of the medley, three bits are John's, followed by three of Paul's, followed by ʽThe Endʼ which is generally Paul's but could be viewed as a collective thing, since most of it is occupied by jamming.

And it is true that many of the links are not particularly special «per se». ʽMean Mr. Mustardʼ sounds fairly pedestrian. ʽShe Came In Through The Bathroom Windowʼ has a vocal melody that is almost primitive by Paul's usual standards of the time. ʽCarry That Weightʼ is just a mildly catchy anthemic refrain — it had to be fattened up by a reprise of ʽYou Never Give Me Your Moneyʼ to save face. But linked all together, they work so well through contrast more than any­thing else. The peaceful, religious serenity of ʽSun Kingʼ shattered to bits with the onset of John's «Brit-character assassination» (first the brother, then the sister Pam). The way John's sarcastic «oh, look out!» at the end of ʽPamʼ segues straight into ʽBathroom Windowʼ. How McCartney's quiet lullaby, addressed to a little baby, magically transforms into «boy, you're gonna carry that weight...», presumably addressed to an already grown-up baby.

And, of course, how ʽThe Endʼ winds it all up by giving all the band members a chance to have their say — with the only three-part guitar jam and the only drum solo in official Beatles history — and bringing it down with just the sort of lyrical testament that the fans would expect from the Beatles. Of course, "and in the end the love you take is equal to the love you make" is a slightly naïve way to formulate the human equivalent of the energy conservation law. But the Beatles' notes always speak far more effectively than their words — and the guitar phrase that brings down the curtain is a gorgeous finale... except that the Beatles wouldn't be the Beatles if they didn't succumb to the tendency to deflate the pathos a little bit — thence came ʽHer Majestyʼ, the first «hidden track» in LP history (the «song» was originally intended to be part of the medley, then excluded and tacked on to the end almost by mistake — but not really by mistake). Some humorless people actually resent its presence — well, it's a hidden track, guys, just pretend it's not there. (CD editions actually list it now, which, I think, is not right.)

Yes, it is true that, by the time the band went into the studio that summer, they already had the first steps of their solo careers projected in their heads. It is also true that they spent less time col­labo­rating on each other's material (Paul himself admitted that Abbey Road suffered from having too few Lennon/McCartney vocal harmonies). But there is also no denying that Abbey Road is a collective album nevertheless. John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band did not have, and could not hope to have, a song like ʽCome Togetherʼ on it. All Things Must Pass, great as it was, did not have a ʽSomethingʼ (ʽI'd Have You Anytimeʼ comes close, mood-wise, but is a bit more impassioned and a little less majestic). And even within Paul, something died that allowed him to make stuff like ʽYou Never Give Me Your Moneyʼ – so complex, diverse, and emotionally non-trivial.

Could there have been another Abbey Road in these guys, had they not parted on such abysmal terms? I cannot exclude that. If you simply take the best solo Lennon, McCartney and Harrison from 1970-71 and slap them together, you won't be getting a Beatles album; but when they got together, the Beatles always brought out the... well, not necessarily the banal «best» in each other, more like a desire to be «unusual», to transcend their own personalities and be somebody else for a bit. John could be the walrus, or, at least, get walrus gumboot; Paul could sing about serial kil­lers; George could at least pretend to dedicate his songs to women; even Ringo could wander around in octopus's gardens instead of singing the ʽNo No Songʼ. Therefore, there is no knowing how a Beatles album from, say, 1973 or 1979 would have sounded like. No knowing at all.

But on the other hand, there is no way more perfect than Abbey Road to bring a band's career to completion. The record does not have everything — it has a little less sunshine, humor, and light­ly colored vibes than you usually expect from the Beatles. All of these things are replaced with extra weight, wisdom, «maturity». But everything other than that, it's got plenty. And once it's all done, ʽThe Endʼ locks and bolts the door, then throws away the key in the direction of ʽHer Ma­jestyʼ. Do we really need more from the Beatles? Just our natural greed calling out. One thing is for sure: Abbey Road would have lost some of its tremendous impact, had its importance and influence been diluted by further releases. And for all those genuinely hungry for more — well, there's always the solo records. No dark, distant, cathartic magic in them, though.

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