Barenaked Ladies: Grinning Streak

BARENAKED LADIES: GRINNING STREAK (2013)

1) Limits; 2) Boomerang; 3) Off His Head; 4) Gonna Walk; 5) Odds Are; 6) Keepin' It Real; 7) Give It Back To You; 8) Best Damn Friend; 9) Did I Say That Out Loud?; 10) Daydreamin'; 11) Smile; 12) Crawl.

With another heavy sigh, I have to admit that The Barenaked Ladies' second post-Page album of original material generates more or less the same impressions as its sleeve photo. To be more pre­cise, it has the very distinct feel of music conceived and executed by a bunch of morose, stern-looking, grayish-haired (var.: bald), suit-and-tie-clad office workers, blankly staring in no particu­lar direction, trying to express something that must have accumulated in their shirt-stuffed breasts and finding themselves completely unable to do it in the least interesting manner.

In other words, Grinning Streak — the title is the best thing here, since it so aptly summarizes their latest developments — proudly wrestles the laurels away from All In Good Time, offering twelve more indie-rock compositions that come and go without creating as much as a ripple. The marginal victory is possibly due to Ed Robertson now writing almost the entirety of the album — only one song goes to Kevin Hearn, and three more are co-credited to Robertson and Better Than Ezra's frontman Kevin Griffin.

On the other hand, Hearn's ʽDaydreamin'ʼ is far from his best: a bouncy soft-rock ditty with faint echoes of techno and psychedelia at the same time, it goes on for far too long on too little fuel, and fails to make proper use of Hearn's best side — tender, honest-sounding sentimentality. The idea here is probably to generate a credible «daydreaming» atmosphere, with a mix of laziness, nonchalance, fantasy, and repetitiveness, but there are no hooks to go along with this mix, and the heavy effects on Hearn's voice make it stupidly robotic rather than wistfully magical. In short, Hearn's minimal presence here is as disappointing as his maximal absence, so we probably should not lay all the blame on Robertson alone...

...as tempting as that is, because he just keeps sinking further and further into the abyss of «gene­ricity» — something like ʽBoomerangʼ, with its syncopated percussion and quiet-to-loud dyna­mics, just sounds like bad Oasis or any other old Brit-pop band who would follow the old Ben Franklin maxim of «those who try to sacrifice memorable riffs for singalong catchy choruses de­serve neither». That it happened to be the first single released from the album just goes to show how utterly directionless the band has become. (For comparison, try ABBA's song of the same name if you really need a fun, energetic pop song).

Of the three numbers co-written with Griffin, only ʽGonna Walkʼ stands out a little bit by being poppier and cutesier than the rest, with a mild martial punch, singalong harmonies, and a jovial atmosphere that provides some respite from the many shades of gray that dominate the record. ʽKeepin' It Realʼ is an exercise in blues-rock grittiness, a somewhat different twist for the Ladies and handled professionally, but, like everything else on here, in a sterile manner — including the «blazing» guitar solo at the end. Particularly awful is the album closer: ʽCrawlʼ is overstretched, overcooked, over-emoted adult contemporary, and you'd probably have to be Ed Robertson's wife, parent, or offspring (or you'd have to want to be any of these) to enjoy the song.

Perhaps if the reviews for All In Good Time had not been all that glowing — praising the band for finally trading in their clown outfits for «mature» suits and ties — Robertson might have had second thoughts about going even further in this «introspective» direction. There is nothing of­fen­sive or unintelligent, per se, in these songs about complicated relationships and personality crises: it is just one of those cases where you almost wish something were offensive or openly dumb — anything at all to break this languid, go-nowhere crust of mediocrity. Unfortunately, at this point, with Grinning Streak getting even more positive reviews from critics who seem to be completely forgetting what it used to mean to be «fun» in rock music, it does not seem likely that  Robertson will be swerving from this steady, unadventurous, concrete-laden path any time soon, so here is another thumbs down in a series that, probably, has not yet run its course.

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Bathory: Blood On Ice

BATHORY: BLOOD ON ICE (1996)

1) Intro; 2) Blood On Ice; 3) Man Of Iron; 3) One Eyed Old Man; 4) The Sword; 5) The Stallion; 6) The Wood­woman; 7) The Lake; 8) Gods Of Thunder, Of Wind And Of Rain; 9) The Ravens; 10) The Revenge Of The Blood On Ice.

Apparently, the story is as follows: In between the «transitional» Blood, Fire And Death and the stylistic revolution and public success of Ham­mer­heart, Quorthon had actually recorded yet another album — one that explored his newly-acquired interest in his Scandinavian heritage even farther than Hammerheart, being sort of a highly cohesive «rock oratorio». Inside was a Nor­dic fan­tasy, loosely based on the motives of Germanic mythology, but «creatively reworked» by Quorthon, presumably in order to avoid being sued by Odin's and Thor's legal representatives for copyright in­fringement — you never know when that lightning might strike you.

Having recorded the master tapes, Quorthon, however, had second thoughts about releasing the album for public consumption — feeling, as he admitted himself, that his fanbase was not yet ready for such a radical image reinvention. The project was therefore shelved, and Quorthon started working on Hammerheart instead. Only six years later, having accidentally leaked the information and received lots of feedback from the fans (who, by that time, were not only well accustomed to his Viking schtick, but probably also felt seriously irritated by Quorthon's subse­quent move to stupid thrash territory), he returned to the old tapes — cleaned them up, remixed them based on improved technology, and finally made them available to everyone under the title of Blood On Ice, which at least sounds a little better than «King Arthur on ice», I'd say.

Frankly speaking, it is not quite clear why this album, had it been out there in 1989, could have been more of a «shock» to fans than Hammerheart. It does suffer in comparison to the latter, but not because of its storyline, or any sort of extra pomposity, or anything like that: it simply does not match Hammerheart in terms of sheer quantity of good ideas. The storyline is a little corny, as is every one-man fantasy-style reworking of any mythological tradition — elegantly shaped and steadily balanced through hundreds of years of «natural selection» — and perhaps he did feel a little shy about unfurling his story of one-eyed wise men, twin-headed Beasts, and eight-legged stallions, replacing it with the superficially more impressive pseudo-historism of Hammerheart. How­ever, Quorthon's verba­city rarely stands in the way of proper music: the real reason why Blood On Ice feels a little disappointing is that, unlike Hammerheart, this one is really envisi­oned as a «musical saga», and the one flaw that could be naturally expected of a musical saga is monotonousness and repetitiveness.

From that angle, Blood On Ice, with its emphasis on the «never-ending riff» rather than the «awe­some riff», has more in common with Twilight Of The Gods, or those particular parts of Hammerheart that pre-announce Twilight (most notably, ʽOne Rode To Asa Bayʼ). The tracks are typically long and repetitive, only occasionally jolted by vocal gimmicks (such as the deep «iron-man» spoken passage in the middle of the title track, or the «one-eyed old man» monolog on the same-titled tune) or an acoustic interlude (ʽThe Ravensʼ; ʽMan Of Ironʼ, despite its title, is actually a crudely constructed acoustic folk ballad as well).

Elsewhere, the riffs are really only there to propel the song forward — martial-wise (title track; ʽThe Stallionʼ) or, sometimes, in a more blues-rocky, almost swampy mode (ʽThe Lakeʼ — did I just say «swampy»?). This is all fine and dandy for a «saga», if we are simply supposed to take this as a heavy backing to Quorthon's story, but if the story happens to be the last thing in which we might be interested on a Bathory album, the number of memorable events on Blood On Ice will not be too large. (For some reason, the only thing that still sticks with me after several listens is the juxtaposition of thumping hooves and bleating sheep — even though I have never suspec­ted myself of anything close to a pastoralist or nomadic mindset...).

Altogether, this one is definitely for the fans, although it goes without say­ing that it does feel a lot like a gulp of fresh, methane-free air after the previous two albums — and that the story, corny elements and all, does show a deep, sincere interest in the Scandinavian pagan tradition: there are conceptual elements in Blood On Ice that may feel clumsy or poorly stated, but there is no denying the passion and the obsessive involvement. Unfortunately, this is not quite enough to properly «reward» the album with a thumbs up.

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Barclay James Harvest: Victims Of Circumstance

BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST: VICTIMS OF CIRCUMSTANCE (1984)

1) Sideshow; 2) Hold On; 3) Rebel Woman; 4) Say You'll Stay; 5) For Your Love; 6) Victims Of Circumstance; 7) Inside My Nightmare; 8) Watching You; 9) I've Got A Feeling.

No big changes from the formula here, either — just small ones, and, as usual, for the worse. For instance, there is a further slight tilt into adult contemporary: ʽI've Got A Feelingʼ, another vile bur­glari­zation of a Beatles title, represents Holroyd's most faithful adoption of the Eighties' sen­ti­mental ballad style (watery synthesizers, trembling falsettos, the works). A little more guitar than there was last time, but what guitar? The leaden arena riffs of ʽHold Onʼ have nothing to do with John's lilting melodic solos.

Perhaps the biggest introduced «novelty» is a set of female singers singing backup, an idea that might have meant wanting to give the record a little soulful-gospel flavor, but ended up, I think, moving the band closer to Europop. One needs to go no further than the album opener: ʽSide­showʼ starts out as a glossy uptempo folk rocker, but then, as massive strings and female choirs start fountaineering from the speakers, it becomes an odd mix of Bee Gees and ABBA (in fact, a few of the string movements are almost openly copied from ʽDancing Queenʼ). As usual, they have the means to pull it off without embarrassment, but the whole style is really so alien for John and Les that they have no means whatsoever to turn it into something remarkable.

Those who have never embarked on an anti-arena rock crusade might get to like the rockier stuff on here. ʽRebel Womanʼ (despite the title, this is, curiously, an anti-Soviet song, written in the wake of the Korean airliner incident) has a streak of grim catchiness, although it could have done better without the irritating synth loops — and, perhaps, with an actual guitar solo (for some rea­son, Lees saves all of his solos for the ballads on this album — an unexplainable choice, since he used to do really well on the fast rockers). ʽInside My Nightmareʼ could have been just as good, had they kept the girls away from the microphone and made the basic guitar riff less sterile. At the very least, the two songs are a refreshing change of pace from the usual mush.

And the usual mush is hardly worth commenting — lots and lots of ballads that mostly reshuffle old ideas, scraped off Bee Gees and Elton John (ʽFor Your Loveʼ) records; I wouldn't be surpri­sed, either, to learn they had been listening to late Genesis and early solo Phil Collins as well (ʽSay You'll Stayʼ definitely has the same atmosphere as ʽFollow You Follow Meʼ). The staying power of these tunes is expectedly close to zero, although, once again, I have to stress: even at this late period, BJH songs are all «forgettable» and «mediocre» rather than openly offensive and embarrassing (unless you start bringing in the lyrics).

It should also be noted that this is the first BJH album on which Holroyd compositions outnumber those of Lees (5:4), and also the first BJH album on which Holroyd compositions are significant­ly weaker, as the man completes the transition from folk-based soft-rock into synth-choked adult contemporary, while Lees still attempts to at least nominally justify the «rock» heritage of the band. Thus, even though at this point there is still no talk whatsoever of splitting the alliance (after all, they didn't just kick Woolly out of the band for nothing: Turn Of The Tide showed how happy they could be as a duo), it is not excluded that the first faint traces of the creative rift can be tracked to some time around this period.

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Blodwyn Pig: Live At The Fillmore West 1970

BLODWYN PIG: LIVE AT THE FILLMORE WEST 1970 (1999)

1) It's Only Love; 2) Ain't Ya Comin' Home Babe?; 3) Dear Jill; 4) Worry; 5) San Francisco Sketches; 6) It's Only Love; 7) Change Song; 8) Cat Squirrel; 9) See My Way; 10) Slow Down; 11) Rock Me.

And, as a last word on Blodwyn Pig, here is a quick account of one of those archival releases that are almost impossible to listen to because of awful sound quality. This here is a show that the band played on the 3rd of August, 1970, shortly before the break-up, but still in peak form: they now had two albums behind their belt, almost two years of gig experience, and some sort of rock vision that they tried to break through to us on Getting To This. And they were playing at the Fill­more West — a good chance to try and blow the Grateful Dead off the stage with some brusk, brawny, British rock'n'roll.

The album loyally presents both of the short sets that the band played on that day, opening for not-too-sure-whom, but the «official bootleg» tag should count as a warning, since the sound quality is that of a good front row audience recording — you can hear all the instruments, but there is no question of any sort of «mixing» present, and this, as far as I can tell, is the norm for most of Blodwyn Pig's non-BBC live recordings, so get ready to live with this if your soul hap­pens to vibrate on the same amplitude with Mick Abrahams.

The biggest problem for me, unfortunately, is not the sound quality, but the fact that this is still only Blodwyn Pig, and that means «B-level». The band was reasonably tight, but never really «Fillmore-proof»: the level of transformation that was implicitly required from studio bands as they became live bands in 1970 is not reached. True, some of the songs are expanded with addi­tional jam sections, and there is also a twelve-minute run through ʽCat's Squirrelʼ, which Mick took with him from his This Was legacy. But their attempts to plow through these sections in «Cream mode», with lengthy solo passages from Abrahams' guitar or Lancaster's sax, end up boring — loud, proud, and sincere, but lacking individuality.

There are also some «atmospheric mistakes» that may embarrass the listener — for instance, in­serting a Tull-esque flute lead part in the beginning of Larry Williams' ʽSlow Downʼ is a classic «conflict of interests», somewhat typical for early 1970s art-rockers wanting to «embellish» the rockabilly oldies with artsy flourishes. On the other hand, when they don't offer no embellish­ments (ʽRock Meʼ), the results are simply non-descript.

On the whole, the album has mostly historical importance — as in, this is the way (or one of the ways) a typically solid, but unexceptional British roots-rock band would structure and conduct its show when guesting on the West Coast; also, in the light of the overall legendary status of Bill Graham's Fillmore enterprise, any extra small piece of the puzzle is always welcome to complete the picture. (For instance, it may be useful to know that Blodwyn Pig weren't booed off the stage or anything — Californian audiences being quite friendly and receptive towards their guests, even if the music was decidedly non-psychedelic). But only a thoroughly omnivorous person, I sup­pose, could listen to this and experience genuine pleasure; in every respect other than historical, this is a thumbs down in the context of all the truly great live shows from its era.

Bob Dylan: The Times They Are A-Changin'

BOB DYLAN: THE TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN' (1964)

1) The Times They Are A-Changin'; 2) Ballad Of Hollis Brown; 3) With God On Our Side; 4) One Too Many Mornings; 5) North Country Blues; 6) Only A Pawn In Their Game; 7) Boots Of Spanish Leather; 8) When The Ship Comes In; 9) The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll; 10) Restless Farewell.

One thing that most people have always felt about Dylan to the near-point of certainty is his ego­centric nature. Behaviorally haughty, instinctively condescending, and in addition to all that, to­tally closed to outsiders — where «outsiders» would begin with the closest friends and relatives and end with everybody else. This is more or less common knowledge, but I have to bring it up because ever so often, caught up in one or another side of Dylan's artistic personality, we forget that we can never be sure of when exactly we are dealing with the «true» Dylan.

It is probably safe to say that «Dylan the folk protest singer», much like «Dylan the newborn Christian» fifteen years later, was essentially a mask that he agreed to wear for a certain period of time, as long as it was helping him with his artistic career. «Mask» does not quite nearly equal «fake», mind you: there is no reason not to believe that, on some level, Bob did sympathize for people like Hollis Brown or Hattie Carroll — and there is every reason to believe the spite and contempt that the man had both for the powers-that-be, as brutally as he is lashing against them on ʽWith God On Our Sideʼ, and for the «mothers and fathers», as gleefully as he is condemning them to the trashbin of history on ʽThe Times They Are A-Changin'ʼ. But sympathizing is one thing, and pledging one's faith is another — The Times They Are A-Changin' is not an album made by a loyal soldier of the Pete Seeger regiment, even if the uninitiated did not understand it all that well back in early 1964.

The decision to release an «all-out» protest song album was quite conscious, and symbolically il­lustrated by the sleeve photo — quite far removed from the clumsy shyness of The Freewheelin', Bob is now trying to put on the look of somebody who has just emerged out of a sweatshop, or, at least, spent his entire childhood collecting Woody Guthrie photos and memorabilia. Again, though, the somber look on his face as he so explicitly looks down upon the evil exploiters (in­cluding everyone who sells and buys his own records) is not particularly «fake» — this is, after all, a great opportunity to indulge in his favorite passion: putting people down, whether it be for his own sake or for the greater good of the planet in general.

The only problem is that, having consciously narrowed down this scope and played out in favor of this particular image, Bob — almost predictably so — did not manage to come up with a sui­tably great bunch of songs. Many of them were, in fact, created already at the time of or even way before The Freewheelin', and some are downright simple rewrites: ʽBoots Of Spanish Leatherʼ, as it is very easy to notice, is essentially the same song as ʽGirl From The North Countryʼ. Like­wise, it is hardly a coincidence that the overall number of tunes here is smaller than on Free­wheelin', while the average length of a single composition has increased by almost a whole mi­nute — something quite typical for a situation of «creative blockage».

Three songs still stand out as major/minor classics. The title track sits here in the same place that was earlier occupied by ʽBlowin' In The Windʼ: its face is more stately, its voice is louder, and its message is far more blunt and unambiguous — blushy shyness being replaced by Biblical thunder as the prophet makes the transition from the liberal-minded salon into the open space of the town market square. It must have taken some gall to write and record a song like that, but someone had to do it, particularly if that someone had to live up to the «generation spokesman» tag (which Bob openly claims to have hated, but ʽThe Times They Are A-Changin'ʼ could only have been written with that specific tag in mind, whether he had already been assigned it or not). The song has nei­ther the depth nor the subtlety of his greatest creations — but it has certainly gone «beyond your command». The guitar may be raggedy and a little out of tune, the lyrics may borrow one too many clichés from the Prophets, and the message may seem less and less pleasant to baby boo­mers as they become grandfathers, but what can we do about it? It's a fucking symbol now, one of those near-ideal generational anthems.

Within the context of the album, though, I think that it is ʽWhen The Ship Comes Inʼ that makes the greater impact — the only song to break up the dirgey bleakness and monotonousness and to shower the curses on the heads of Bob's enemies in a faster, more playful (and, therefore, a little more sadistic) mode: inspired by Jenny's pirate tune in The Threepenny Opera and an accident where Bob was refused hotel admission for not being clean enough, it is the most gleefully dan­ceable of Bob's protest songs, and probably the one that his Jewish ancestors would be the most proud of, not just because it namedrops Goliath and the Pharaoh among those who will be crushed when the ship comes in, but also because, of all those early songs, it is the only one that gives the listener a clear vision of that happy end we're all hoping for. And it's catchy, too, but what wouldn't be catchy if it were inspired by Threepenny Opera?

The rest of the social / political songs on the album rarely reach these highs, not just because they are lyrically much more tied in with specific cases and particular situations, but also because they simply happen to be too drawn out and dreary. ʽWith God On Our Sideʼ gives you nine verses of irony when one could easily do with just three or four — the melody is boring, the energy level is low, and the lyrics are extremely questionable in the light of Bob's usual standards (I have always thought that the verse about the Germans was particularly poorly thought out — do the lines "though they murdered six millions... the Germans now, too, have God on their side" imply that the correct alternative would have been to wipe the Germans off the face of the Earth, once and for all? Probably not, but that is one of the easiest interpretations).

ʽThe Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carrollʼ has more direct involvement on Bob's part, and would have probably made a great impact had it been performed on the day of the William Zantzinger trial (August 28, 1963), but, at the risk of understating its importance for the history of anti-racist struggle in the US, I would dare say that the song is quite boring on the whole, and that its slow, stuttering, droning verses have nothing even close to the fist-clenching effect that a song like ʽHurricaneʼ would produce more than a decade later — even if, as a person, Hattie Carroll might be deserving more of our empathy than Ruben Carter (if anything, merely for the fact that Hattie Carroll is dead and Ruben Carter is not). The lyrical description of the woman's murder and of the rigged trial, and the acid condemnation of those who «philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears» is brilliant — the execution seems way too poorly thought out (although, of course, there are quite a few Dylanologists that would be happy to fight that idea).

In any case, the best song on The Times They Are A-Changin' happens to be one of the few that completely lack any sociopolitical undercurrent — it is also the shortest and, at first, least noticeable of these tunes, still completely in the vein of the «humble mumble» of Freewheelin'. ʽOne Too Many Morningsʼ (Steve Jobs' favorite song, no less!) has only three verses, a barely audible fingerpicking melody that rolls out far more smoothly from under Bob's fingers than the scrapy, wobbly strum of ʽThe Times They Are A-Changin'ʼ, and a beautiful melancholic aura — I like to think of it as a sequel to ʽDon't Think Twiceʼ, in which our hero contemplates the choices he has made and feels a little guilty and repentant about it, all the while being extra careful to not let us understand this directly. But even if not, it is still the most personal and deeply human tune on the whole album — even more so than the closing ʽRestless Farewellʼ, where Bob once again dons the travelin' minstrel cap and sings a well-meant, but formulaic dinner ballad for the king and his court.

On the whole, The Times They Are A-Changin' is a misstep — the only time in Bob's entire career, perhaps, when he went ahead and delivered an album that somebody expected him to de­liver: an artistic mistake he would never repeat again. But considering that he was still young, fresh, full of creative juices, energy, and invigorated with his success in «the right circles», it is also no wonder that the record is listenable, contains no major embarrassments (if one discounts the superfluous song lengths and a few lamentable lyrical slip-ups), and still has a bunch of clas­sic songs that rank all the way up there with his best. For these reasons, I would rather resist the temptation of giving it a thumbs down — even the worst Dylan record of the 1960s is still an es­sential listen for everybody who has a basic interest in the man. Besides, as a social stimulus — a musical protest statement — it certainly worked back in 1964, and might as well continue wor­king for a long time, as long as the English language doesn't change too much.

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Brenda Lee: This Is... Brenda

BRENDA LEE: THIS IS... BRENDA (1960)

1) When My Dreamboat Comes Home; 2) I Want To Be Wanted; 3) Just A Little; 4) Pretend; 5) Love And Learn; 6) Teach Me Tonight; 7) Hallelujah I Love Him So; 8) Walkin' To New Orleans; 9) Blueberry Hill; 10) We Three (My Echo, My Shadow, And Me); 11) Build A Big Fence; 12) If I Didn't Care.

Brenda's second LP from 1960 was already a much tighter affair: recorded in about six months' time (as opposed to two years), although still in six separate sessions, showcasing the obsessive perfectionism of her Nashville team. In keeping up with the times — and the times were signifi­cantly influenced by whatever Elvis was doing ever since his return from the army — the record moves farther away from the rockabilly spirit: this time, nearly half of the songs are ballads, and the rest drift between soft, careful, politely danceable Brill Building pop and Southern rhythm and blues. There is still a thin rebellious streak running through the record, but it gets harder to discern it behind the layers of conventionalism, particularly in the songwriting.

The album's big hit, in fact, one of Brenda's biggest, was ʽI Want To Be Wantedʼ, an English translation of an Italian pop song — but, fair enough, Brenda did manage to almost completely strip the tune of its theatrical Italian flavor and imbue it with some Nashville tough-girl stuffing instead: where its Italian versions (Tony Dallara, etc.) were troubadourish (wimpy, that is), the new English words ("I wanna be wanted right now, not tomorrow, but right now!") are sung by Brenda with such power that it's pretty easy to see how the song was destined for red-hot number-oneness in an era of sexual build-up — you could almost see the Beatles as a response to this desperate plea for release. The song itself is a trifle, but the interpretation is pure gold.

There is more to that story: the choice of cover tunes also includes ʽTeach Me Tonightʼ (again, sung with such determination that one wonders who'd be teaching whom), and Betty Chotas' ʽJust A Littleʼ with a decidedly hooliganish drawl in the chorus. I am not implying that the whole album goes like that, or even that these particular songs have a notably stronger erotic effect than so much competition at the time — but I am implying that some of this stuff must have sounded fairly risqué for a 16-year old (even if the exact age still remains undetectable on the record), and that thinking of This Is... Brenda in these terms adds some much-needed thrill.

Particularly since she is still too young to bring in any sophisticated nuance: the purely romantic ballads, such as ʽPretendʼ and ʽIf I Didn't Careʼ, suffer from too much formula, and when it comes to covers of well-known songs, there is not much she is able to add to the legacy of ʽBlue­berry Hillʼ (the speeding up and the playful hiccup are not much help), or to Ray Charles' ʽHalle­lujah I Love Her Soʼ (except to change the «her» to «him»). They're fun (good songs that are very hard to spoil in the first place), but never essential.

Musically, we are offered the same expert Nashville backing here as usual, with more strings and less guitar work than I'd like to hear and only one truly inventive, «muffled» sax solo from Boots Randolph on the ʽLove & Learnʼ shuffle. Still, this is all generally within the pop-rock formula of the time, with tight limits set on sentimentality quotas — it is only the lack of one or two outstan­ding displays of fast-paced joyful aggressiveness, like ʽDynamiteʼ, that are indicative of the curve having narrowly passed its peak; and even without a ʽDynamiteʼ to its name, This Is... Brenda is one of the girl's best and naturally deserves a thumbs up.

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Architecture In Helsinki: In Case We Die

ARCHITECTURE IN HELSINKI: IN CASE WE DIE (2005)

1) Neverevereverdid; 2) It'5!; 3) Tiny Paintings; 4) Wishbone; 5) Maybe You Can Owe Me; 6) Do The Whirlwind; 7) In Case We Die; 8) The Cemetery; 9) Frenchy, I'm Faking; 10) Need To Shout; 11) Rendezvous: Potrero Hill; 12) What's In Store?

Maybe they did not follow the optimal strategy (as in, «hire a responsible songwriter»), but there has been a strategic change all the same, and a good one: push up the energy level. The creative, joyful, intelligent kids of Fingers Crossed, sitting in their living-rooms and making psychedelic paintings on wallpaper, are now running out into the yards, so that they can take part in active games and dispel the «lonesome nerd» tag that one could very easily have attached to them just two years ago. In other words — In Case We Die, we are going to leave behind a pretty lively trace of our former existence.

All the basic ingredients remain the same: Architecture In Helsinki are still an eight-piece band, with brass and string instruments mattering as much as, if not more than, acoustic and electric guitars, friendly electronics, and the male / female contrast between core members (Cameron Bird and Kellie Sutherland). Just like before, they are unwilling to learn to seriously play those instru­ments, although they do try to attack the songwriting task with a little more responsibility; just like before, they seem to regard their mission as that of building a powerful kaleidoscope of color­ful sounds, preferring to quickly abandon any idea before it actually starts working, rather than stick around it for too much time. Fairies dancing at the bottom of the garden, right?

Even the bell chime that opens the album is soft and kiddish — nothing like the deep, chilly toll of Lennon's ʽMotherʼ or AC/DC's ʽHells Bellsʼ — and what it sets out to announce is a small, cutesy «twee-symphony» (ʽNeverevereverdidʼ), spreading its three parts (rhythmless atmospheric intro; slow, slightly dissonant, march; fast, exuberant kiddie song) over five minutes and stating all the important points in the process. The build-up, climax, and release are quite thoughtfully controlled, and if I had been more in love with the essential ideology of the band, ʽNeverever­everdidʼ would probably be the perfect AiH composition for me. «Yes for toddlers», perhaps. The major problem is that a real toddler would be unlikely to appreciate this twee-symphony, and it is not clear whether it truly deserves to wake the internal toddler lurking inside the grown-up lis­tener, because all of this supposedly innocent, free-flowing joy emanating from the song still feels a little forced and artificial.

ʽIt'5!ʼ (sic), compressing its point to two rather than five minutes, is also a perfect encapsulation of the band's pseudo-message. Minimalistic, very loosely joined at all of its harmonic hips, with lyrics that make neither literal nor coherent figurative sense, and a vocal hook that transforms indie mumble into cheerleader scream — it will either lure you in with its absurdist naïveness and baby innocence, or deeply offend you by not making artistic sense. On the other hand, there is no use getting offended at a bunch of silly prancing on the lawn, particularly since there is nothing to suggest that the band regards its art as something more deep and meaningful than that.

What really does sadden me is that, with such a vast amount of different people, instruments, and musical ideas at their disposal, the mood and emotional impact are so similar on just about every track — so much so that commenting on individual tracks seems essentially useless, even if this does happen to be the band's best album. Admittedly, ʽDo The Whirlwindʼ has a gruffer keyboard tone than usual, and is almost on the verge of becoming a gutsy «electrofunk» number (I detect a little bit of Prince influence here), but even that gets scrambled midway through, as the vocals shift from stern to sissy, and chimes and cellos chase the dance beat away. Everything else stays firmly within the confines of the exact same fairyland playground. («Playful pop majesty» was the expression used by the All-Music Guide reviewer, which I heartily disagree with — playful, definitely, pop, most likely, but there is about as much «majesty» in this album as there usually may be perceived in a typical infant).

Still, by speeding up the tempos (ʽThe Cemeteryʼ), introducing a wee bit more screechy / croaky electric riffs (ʽFrenchy, I'm Fakingʼ), and stirring up inevitable memories of SMiLE (to which this album relates like a clumsy, inexperienced, but admiring and aspiring younger brother), In Case We Die manages to wrench out a thumbs up — want it or not, it has its own face, and that face is curious to look upon, even if it is so hard to decide whether you like it or not, or whether it is a natural face or the result of one too many plastic surgeries. Perhaps if Frank Zappa wanted to deconstruct Mother Goose, the end product would look something like that — then again, know­ing Frank, it probably wouldn't: In Case We Die is much too safe, too clean, too sterile for the likes of real naughty music revolutionaries.

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Barenaked Ladies: All In Good Time

BARENAKED LADIES: ALL IN GOOD TIME (2010)

1) You Run Away; 2) Summertime; 3) Another Heartbreak; 4) Four Seconds; 5) On The Lookout; 6) Ordinary; 7) I Have Learned; 8) Every Subway Car; 9) Jerome; 10) How Long; 11) Golden Boy; 12) I Saw It; 13) The Love We're In; 14) Watching The Northern Lights.

Did the departure of Steven Page make any difference? Frankly speaking, Page and Robertson seem to have always been very much alike in form and spirit — nothing like a John/Paul or a Mick/Keith dichotomy here, which was really a weakness for The Ladies: you had to be a serious fan to understand the difference in seasoning that each of the two brought to the table. If any­thing, it was Kevin Hearn who used to be responsible for a differently colored streak, that of instantly likeable innocent sentimentality, and he was the one that didn't quit.

In short, the loss of Page could be expected to bring about a slight drop in quality control, at worst. Instead, it brought about the worst that could ever have happened — «MATURITY», as some of the critics called it, almost happy to notice that, finally, the Barenaked Ladies have shed off their goofy, oddball image, stopped pranking around like overgrown kids, and started writing and recording really serious, responsible, intelligent material that would probably help their fan­base mature and become serious and responsible as well.

Unfortunately, critics tend to have short memories — and it's hard to blame them, given the ever-growing waves of new artistic material engulfing them every day — so their basis for comparison must have been (a) the latest of the Ladies' oeuvres, which was Snacktime!; (b) ʽOne Weekʼ; and (c) maybe some of the earliest goof-off songs like ʽBe My Yoko Onoʼ, because the first cut is the deepest and suchlike. What they did not remember, as it seems, is that the Ladies' first concentra­ted attempt at achieving serious maturity was already on their very second album, and that, since then, the general tendency was rather predictable: the more serious they got, the more tedious and generic their records tended to sound (Born On A Pirate Ship? Barenaked Ladies Are Me?) — the more they indulged in their prankish side, the more smart and sympathetic they managed to come out (Stunt / Maroon, Barenaked Ladies Are Men).

My confession is as follows: as I reached the middle of ʽYou Run Awayʼ, I was almost ready to cry — not because the song was so emotionally moving, but because it was already more or less obvious how miserable my next fifty minutes would become. The song is not particularly awful or anti-melodic or anything: it simply bears the thickest, densest stamp of «generic indie» to ever come from these guys. It sounds like a perfect soundtrack element to a Nora Ephron movie — echoey, soul-probing pianos, confessional, slightly trembling vocals, gradual build-up towards a rock guitar explosion, the works. It is something that would be completely natural for a prover­bially mediocre outfit like the Dave Matthews Band. It is something I have no interest whatsoever in hearing from The Barenaked Ladies, and do not, for the life of me, understand why should anybody else. And this is only just the beginning.

In Robertson's defense, I must say that the heavy riff-rockers on the album do not usually produce the same feeling of hollowness and fakeness. ʽSummertimeʼ starts out unimpressively, but gets better as the power-pop elements start coming through; the pissed-off rant ʽI Have Learnedʼ is acceptable alt-rock, stuck somewhere in between Pearl Jam and Alanis Morissette in spirit, but with classier production (and in the Ladies' case, «classier» always means «closer in form to the band's garage / glam sources of inspiration»). The fake-o-meter usually starts convulsing on the balladeering front — ʽOrdinaryʼ, ʽThe Love We're Inʼ, all that stuff. But this does not mean that the heavy riff-rockers will want to continue to keep you company once the album is over — the riffs themselves don't have anything particularly unusual or stunning about them.

In disasters like these, you can usually count on Kevin Hearn to come in with something idiosyn­cratic, but not this time. ʽAnother Heartbreakʼ has a pretty vocal part (I continue to insist that Kevin has always been the most expressive vocalist of the bunch), but the song quickly descends into clichéd distorted indie-rock. ʽJeromeʼ is a somewhat visionary landscape, a melancholy tri­bute to the departed Old West that somehow ends up cluttered with too much percussion. And ʽWatching The Northern Lightsʼ is an atmospheric conclusion to the album that matches its title rather well — the repetitive, reverb-delay-filled arrangement and trance-inducing vocals really create the impression of lying on one's back and watching them Northern Lights. But, once again, this sort of lazy ambience is simply not what one expects from this kind of band. They will not be stealing any bread off of Enya's plate, anyway, so why bother?

In the middle of all this, there is exactly 1 (one) «goof-off» number on the entire record: ʽFour Secondsʼ is an absurdist vaudeville number that sounds like Tom Waits adapted for toddlers (an outtake from Snacktime!, perhaps?). Its uniqueness works well in terms of memorability, but it can hardly hope to turn the tide, surrounded by all that run-of-the-mill alt-rock stuff — in fact, it only makes matters worse, reminding of the true call of the Ladies. That true call is to play the smart, sarcastic, snappy fool, not to try and turn into a «guitar rock band with soul», a market niche where competition is hot and the Ladies are not welcome at all. Thumbs down.

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Bathory: Octagon

BATHORY: OCTAGON (1995)

1) Immaculate Pinetreeroad #930; 2) Born To Die; 3) Psychopath; 4) Sociopath; 5) Grey; 6) Century; 7) 33 Some­thing; 8) War Supply; 9) Schizianity; 10) Judgement Of Posterity; 11) Deuce.

This is where we hit total rock bottom: think Requiem, but without all the good riffs. Keeping the tempos, Quorthon completely jettisons any attempts at decent songwriting — most of this stuff is headed straight for the moshing pit and nowhere else. Perhaps the idea was that Requiem did not manage to be nearly as extreme as Quorthon envisaged it, so he gave us something even more blunt, minimalistic, and «parodic» in the bad sense of the word.

If it can be any consolation, the vocals are cleaner this time, closer in execution and effect to classic early Bathory than the «gargling-one's-own-vomit» approach of Requiem. On the other hand, the lyrics have deteriorated beyond repair: ʽ33 Somethingʼ is Quorthon's «tribute» to the execution of serial killer John Wayne Gacy, about which he must have read in the papers circa 1994, and if the «song» is supposed to make one experience disgust towards the killer, it fails — by offering neither a hint at melody nor a glimpse of truly scary imagery. "Blooded hole, twisted soul, eat my shit, suck my dick", goes the refrain. Okay then.

One does not have to go much farther than the song titles — ʽPsychopathʼ, ʽSociopathʼ (back to back!), ʽSchizianityʼ — to understand what it is all about: a dumb experiment in going to sonic and verbal extremes, perhaps (who knows?) consciously aimed at offending and alienating Quor­thon's heavily expanded fanbase. In the process, lines are completely blurred between heavy me­tal and hardcore (much of this record could have very easily come from the hands of, say, Agno­stic Front), but not in a triumphant synthesis of the genres, rather in a catastrophic meltdown of both. A few of the songs slow down the tempos (ʽCenturyʼ, ʽSchizianityʼ), but then they end up sounding like derivative and cumbersome attempts to revive the old New Wave of British heavy metal — not as utterly dumb, perhaps, but just as forgettable.

Biggest surprise, and most decent entry on the album, is a cover of ʽDeuceʼ — yes, the KISS song, possibly thought of as another ironic slap in the face to the fans: Bathory's evil / brutal sound used to be as far removed from the glam-rock theater of KISS as possible, yet here is Quorthon coming out of the closet, confessing his loyalty not only to the old-school thrash masters (which could be understood), but to the make-up wearing poseurs as well. As an expectation-breaker, the gesture could actually be adorable — if not for the fact that the cover is all too faithful, yet all too per­functory, carrying over neither the caveman cockiness of Gene Simmons, nor the garage crude­ness of early KISS guitars (for that matter, cold as I usually am towards KISS, ʽDeuceʼ is one of their greatest songs, and nobody has ever played it quite like those guys).

In short, another failure — experimental failure, to be precise, not a corny «sell-out» or anything, just firm final proof that not everything Quorthon tried to do turned to gold. Black metal, yes; Viking metal, for sure; but troglodytish thrashing — no. (I almost caught myself trying to type in something like "the guy was just too intelligent to properly get this style", but then realized I have way too little knowledge about Quorthon's degree of intelligence to make this into even a purely hypo­thetical statement). Thumbs down, and it would be easy to pretend that this album never actually happened — after all, «failed experiments» do not have to be considered as a natural part of the artist's general curve.  

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Barclay James Harvest: Ring Of Changes

BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST: RING OF CHANGES (1983)

1) Fifties' Child; 2) Looking From The Outside; 3) Teenage Heart; 4) High Wire; 5) Midnight Drug; 6) Waiting For The Right Time; 7) Just A Day Away; 8) Paraiso Dos Cavalos; 9) Ring Of Changes.

There is practically nothing that could be called «synth-pop» on this album, but neither is there anything that would even remotely qualify for a «rock» sound. Acoustic guitars, keyboards, and orchestration fully dominate the proceedings: Ring Of Changes is Barclay's mellowest album since the very beginning, and that says a lot, considering how mellow they had been since 1974. In a way, this is even curious, because the record goes against the grain: in 1983, «mellow» usu­ally meant stuffing your songs with bland synthesizer tones that reached all the way to heaven, not placing your trust in old-fashioned cellos and violins.

Much of the credit for this must proba­bly go to the band's new producer, Pip Williams, who was previously mostly known for produ­cing a long bunch of Status Quo records — but who also helped relaunch the comeback of The Moody Blues. And, supposedly, once he had helped the «rich man's Moody Blues» get back on their creative feet with Long Distance Voyager and The Present (the only two of their Eighties' records that could at least partially match the quality of the old days), it must have been only natural for him to go across and try and do the same thing with the «poor man's Moody Blues».

The beginning is weirdly promising: a baroque chamber music passage instead of the expected synthesizers. Midway through, the strings turn Hollywoodish, though, and then sink into the background as ʽFifties' Childʼ finally takes shape as a typical BJH number: soft, romantic, thinly intellectual, mildly nostalgic, just a teeny bit touching while it's on, and completely forgettable when it's off. The vocal melody in some respects seems like a variation on the already not-too-awesome ʽHymnʼ — and the message is of comparable profundity: ʽLove was a lesson we tried to learn / There were no exams to pass or failʼ. With each passing year, as nostalgic tributes to Sixties' idealism keep multiplying and, consequently, depreciating in net value, there is less and less motivation to be interested in this one.

But you know what? Easily the best thing about ʽFifties' Childʼ is its bassline — all of a sudden, Holroyd's lines start drawing more attention to themselves than whatever Lees is doing, because the guy suddenly gets the urge to make them as melodic and expressive as possible. Maybe he had some serious Sgt. Pepper inhalation or something, but the way he explores all possible swerves from the basic rhythm is really the only thing that prevents me from falling asleep to Lees' soft preaching. And later on, it turns out that this is not an exception: about half of the songs here have excellent basswork: ʽHigh Wireʼ, ʽJust A Day Awayʼ, ʽMidnight Drugʼ... we probably have Pip Williams to thank for putting these parts so high in the mix, but, whatever be the situa­tion, Ring Of Changes is the first album in the BJH catalog that made me aware of Holroyd's above-average talents as bass player.

Holroyd is also responsible for the most memorable, if also most repetitive and unadventurous, bass phrase on the album — the pulsating loop that drives the title track, which is itself an anthem to the endless cycle of life, going on for way too long (unless the underlying message is that the endless cycle of life is a continuous bore, which would be at least worth considering) but cleverly arranged, with the bass loop, the grumbling electronic bleeps, and the strange Eastern-vibe strings combining in a unique manner. The bass loop and the bleeps might illustrate the relentless cogs of life locked in an endless grind, but the psychedelic strings?.. Makes one wonder.

As for the rest of the songs, they're okay — on the whole, less satisfactory than Turn Of The Tide because of the lack of a rock sound (not a single uplifting Lees solo!), but, as usual, melodic and somewhat memorable for those who will stand several listens. Occasionally, they do begin to sound like late period Bee Gees (ʽWaiting For The Right Timeʼ — strange that Les held back on singing this one in falsetto, all the other adult contemporary ingredients already present), but on the whole, the 1970s folk-pop vibe is still prevalent, and as long as they manage to hold out against mainstream Eighties' values, BJH are still a listenable outfit.

One last particular mention: the orchestration on ʽParaiso Dos Cavalosʼ, John's hyper-sentimental ode to a horseback vacation in Portugal, is absolutely marvelous — formulaic and a little cheesy, perhaps, but the New World Philharmonic Orchestra, conducted by David Katz, gives the song a far more uplifting and grandiose flavor than its main melody. Probably an accident — on the whole, the orchestral arrangements on the album are not too adventurous — but every happy ac­cident on a late period BJH album counts, because that's what a typical late period BJH album usually is: mush and mediocrity with an occasional tasty treat for the seeker.

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Blodwyn Pig: The Basement Tapes

BLODWYN PIG: THE BASEMENT TAPES (1998)

1) The Modern Alchemist; 2) Mr. Green's Blues; 3) It's Only Love; 4) See My Way; 5) Blues Of A Dunstable Truck Driving Man; 6) Baby Girl; 7) The Leaving Song; 8) I Know; 9) It's Only Love; 10) See My Way; 11) Blues Of A Dunstable Truck Driving Man; 12) Hound Dog; 13) Drive Me.

Blodwyn Pig belongs to that slightly irritating kind of bands whose official catalog of archival re­leases has managed to surpass in quantity (but definitely not in quality) the number of their ori­ginal LPs. This is probably due mainly to the activities of Mick Abrahams, or perhaps the band was blessed with a small, but energetic fan club — in any case, there is at least half a dozen CDs on various labels out there, collecting all sorts of outtakes, rarities, and live performance recor­dings, most of these in really bad quality. It would hardly make any sense to list them all, but a couple might be worth a brief mention.

First, there is this collection, somewhat arrogantly called The Basement Tapes even though not only does it not even begin to approach the relative importance of Bob Dylan & The Band's famed release — to the best of my understanding, it wasn't even recorded in any sort of basement, unless, of course, the BBC Studios put Blodwyn Pig on their special «basement list» reserved for second-rate artists. Basement or no basement, though, at the very least this is one of the cleanest-sounding archive releases for Blodwyn Pig, which is already reassuring.

The recordings are divided into three unequal parts. The first three tracks, with the original lineup, were made in 1969 for the Top Gear program. The next eight tracks date from the band's brief re­union in 1974 and thus happen to be the most historically important, since that lineup, which hap­pened to include former Jethro Tull drummer Clive Bunker instead of Ron Berg, left behind no original studio recordings — these eight tracks all come from John Peel's and Radio 1 Live In Concert BBC archives. Finally, as an odd postscriptum, two more tracks are tackled at the end that were recorded by Abrahams and his backing musicians as late as 1990 — prior to the recor­ding of Lies, but long after the world had forgotten that «Blodwyn Pig» used to be the name of a band and not some special Welsh recipé for pork roast.

The 1969 tracks do not deserve much special mention, other than to say that ʽMr. Green's Bluesʼ is a slightly revised version of ʽUp And Comingʼ, with a long spoken rant on John Peel occu­pying what used to be the wordless instrumental section. The rant is funny ("my friend John Peel is a vegetarian, he's got the greens, and that's why he got the blues, 'cause he's got the greens, he don't eat no meat y'all"), but not funny enough to make history: ʽThe Modern Alchemistʼ is far more impressive, but, unfortunately, not too different from the studio version.

The 1974 lineup is more interesting: in addition to two rather scorching versions of ʽSee My Wayʼ, they actually try out some new material, such as the nifty folk-blues acoustic number ʽBlues Of A Dunstable Truck Driving Manʼ, done by Mick in the Piedmont tradition; and the len­gthy jazz/blues/folk suite ʽI Knowʼ, conceived in the overall style of Getting To This, but less diverse and evocative than ʽSan Francisco Sketchesʼ. In any case, Mick's speedy 'n' greedy solo­ing on ʽSee My Wayʼ is arguably the most spark-sending part of these sessions.

Finally, the new tracks are — not exactly an embarrassment, but an incongruent oddity. They give the album a certain «then & now» flavor, but at the expense of common sense: why exactly is Mick covering ʽHound Dogʼ, and remaking it as a generic modern blues-rock exercise in the process? And why does the «original» ʽDrive Meʼ sound like somebody's semi-successful attempt to remake Aerosmith's ʽLast Childʼ, changing a few chords, but carrying over Brad Whitford's sleazy-echoey guitar tone?

Oh well: at the very least, The Basement Tapes has the crazy audacity to provoke these ques­tions, so it is probably not a complete loss. That said, I wish I could say that the record was re­commended strictly for diehard Blodwyn Pig fans, but it is hard for me to picture a real, life-size diehard Blodwyn Pig fan — although somebody must have probably bought the album when it came out originally, or maybe Mick just has a large, extended family. Anyway, it's not at all a bad listen, and the sound quality is as good as it usually gets with BBC standards.

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Bob Dylan: The Freewheelin'

BOB DYLAN: THE FREEWHEELIN' (1963)

1) Blowin' In The Wind; 2) Girl From The North Country; 3) Masters Of War; 4) Down The Highway; 5) Bob Dy­lan's Blues; 6) A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall; 7) Don't Think Twice, It's All Right; 8) Bob Dylan's Dream; 9) Oxford Town; 10) Talking World War III Blues; 11) Corrina, Corrina; 12) Honey, Just Allow Me One More Chance; 13) I Shall Be Free.

Common knowledge has it that The Freewheelin', released in May 1963, singlehandedly trans­formed pop music into a serious occupation. The album was loyally recorded in a folk paradigm (with one exception, all the songs strictly respect the Holy Trinity of Bob's voice, Bob's acoustic guitar, and Bob's harmonica), but inspired legions of rockers all the same, including the Beatles, who immediately turned Dylan into an object of worship and began writing songs like ʽI'm A Loserʼ, expanding their active stock of English words and idiomatics.

Common knowledge does not lie — not in this particular case, at least, since the enormous influ­ence of The Freewheelin' on so many things that came after it is well-documented in numerous sources. However, common knowledge may also do the album a disservice. Once it came out, it was mainly the words that caught everybody's attention. The melodies were well played, but they were familiar — just about all of these songs were based on traditional patterns, which Dylan simply expropriated for his own needs: typical behavior for old-school blues and folk troubadours, perhaps, but not something that was expected of the emerging modern-day singer-songwriter. The vocals were... well, you know: «atypical», to say the least. The words — this was stuff that mat­tered. And it did not even matter so much what exactly these words were, but the very fact that, somehow, they seemed sharp, deep, and acutely relevant for 1963 made The Freewheelin' into this cult classic, and then, into one of the most respectable LPs ever released.

But you probably know all that. The real question is — how does the album hold up after all these years? Hundreds, thousands perhaps, of colorful rock poets have emerged since then, some of them shamefully derivative, some, on the other hand, proudly standing up to Bob's verbal talents. The historical importance, once so evident and overwhelming, has receded inside text­books and critical best-of-ever lists. The melodies have been bested, the phrasing has found its rivals, and, for what it's worth, one can always find these songs performed by more skillful voca­lists in improved arrangements — starting with Peter, Paul and Mary's ʽBlowin' In The Windʼ and ending with Elvis' ʽDon't Think Twice, It's All Rightʼ...

...and this is where we have to make a serious comment. In general, the world of those who know something about Dylan in the first place is divided in two sections: the «Dylan For Dylan» sec­tion prefers Bob's own original versions, whereas the «Dylan For Others» section prefers liste­ning to Bob's oeuvres done by those artists who embellish them with intricate arrangements and, most importantly, «clean vocals». Dylan or Joan Baez? Dylan or The Byrds? Dylan or Manfred Mann? Dylan or The Hollies? Dylan or The Band? Dylan or Hendrix? Dylan or Rod Stewart? Dylan or Joe Cocker?... and the list goes on. And considering that Dylan's «composing genius» is questionable, to say the least (more on that later), and also con­sidering that we do not really listen to pop music for the words, no matter how fascinating their combinations might be, this adoption of his songs by other artists basically means that the «Dylan For Others» party can get along very well by drop-kicking Dylan altogether.

The stark-raving «Dylan For Dylan» section has some problems, too: much too often, its mem­bers regard Dylan covers as watered-down, dumbed-down for mass consumption, «prettied up» and losing their essence as a result. This is true in that, once a Dylan song becomes a Dylan cover, it usually ceases to be a Dylan song — I have never heard a single Dylan cover (at least, not by a major artist) that would honestly try to preserve the exact spirit of the original. But instead of complaining, it is much more healthy and pleasing to admire how much additional potential there is in all these songs — and how smoothly they yield to musical reinterpretation, be it the epic hard rock thunderstorm of Hendrix's ʽAll Along The Watchtowerʼ or the smooth reggae wobble of Clapton's ʽKnockin' On Heaven's Doorʼ.

In other words, I not only refuse to join either party, but I would strongly admonish everyone else to merge the ranks as well, regardless of whether this means learning to enjoy and respect the simple, acces­sible pleasures of Dylan covers, or — something that is usually more difficult for people — learning to understand and soak in the uniqueness of Dylan originals. In which tasks we should all take our lessons from the musicians themselves. The Byrds loved ʽMr. Tambourine Manʼ so much that they covered it, and Dylan loved their version in return (although his famous comment of "wow, you can dance to it!" may, of course, be interpreted ironically — but then, back in 1965 everything that came out of Dylan's mouth had to have an ironic twist).

But let us get back to business. ʽBlowin' In The Windʼ and ʽA Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fallʼ, the two major anthems of Freewheelin', are somewhat similar in structure — based on the old folk «listing» principle, the former keeps asking one meaningless question after the other, while the latter keeps piling up one loose impression and reminiscence after the other. There is a striking contrast here — the amount of briefly skimmed themes and topics is staggering, yet the manner in which they are skimmed (feeble acoustic picking and mumbled vocals) is almost humiliatingly unassuming: Dylan's lack of a strong singing voice is turned to his utter advantage, as he sings about these issues the same way an old hobo could be begging for a drop of whiskey.

On the other hand, he does sing, and the serious singing tone, devoid of hiccups, gulps, and other ways of overstating his purpose, that he had previously only shown on ʽSong To Woodyʼ, is well represented on both of the anthems. And in all honesty, the more I listen to them, the more I am becoming convinced that it is a marvelous singing tone for these kinds of songs. At this stage in his career, Bob prefers to leave his «eccentric» vocal tricks for his lightweight material — the heavyweight stuff, on the other hand, is given over to his world-weary, prophetic persona, which is at the same time skeptical and idealistic: "the answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind" sounds hopeful and reassuring for one moment, then bitter and disillusioned for the next one. That is one damn fine nuance that Peter, Paul and Mary were not able to transfer to their inter­pretation — nor, for that matter, was anybody else.

ʽDon't Think Twice, It's All Rightʼ is an early example of Dylan's misogynistic persona — and, since he still had rather small means of overcoming his shyness, probably the least irritating and the most motivated for those who can be bothered by such things. The message is offensive ("you just kinda wasted my precious time" is, come to think of it, a far meaner thing to say than to just call her a fuckin' bitch), but it is delivered in such soothing packaging — the hyper-tender style of acoustic plucking, the soft murmuring that culminates in a most nonchalant, blurry recital of the last chorus line, the overall almost lullaby-style atmosphere of it all — Dylan's evil magic at work: you end up emotionally sympathizing with the protagonist despite understanding precisely well that he's really a doggone bastard.

His theatrical nature does show up a little bit — especially in the way that he so carefully articulates the final "-d" in the incorrect verbal form ("...the light I never know-eD"). Sure, he just wants to emphasize the formal rhyme with "road", but the trick has the effect of aligning the guy with the low-class language fuddlers: «uneducated, but experi­enced through trouble and toil, and endowed with natural wisdom». How do you condemn a guy like that? You don't — you have no choice left but to empathize.

The other two well-known highlights of the «grim» part of the album have not become household staples, for understandable reasons — ʽGirl From The North Countryʼ would soon be over­shadowed by Simon & Garfunkel's ʽParsley, Sage...ʼ, since it is really a courteous, troubadourish song that lended itself better to Paul and Art's formally beautiful, elegiac arrangement; and ʽMas­ters Of Warʼ was just too brutal and straightforward in its onslaught (Dylan himself occasionally expressed surprise at his being able to explicitly wish for somebody's death in a song — not that he would ever change the lyrics in concert, I think).

Which should not detract from their virtues: ʽGirl From The North Countryʼ has all the tenderness of ʽDon't Think Twiceʼ without the sarcasm and woman-bashing — not that Bob's intonations convey the slightest superficial trace of sadness or longing for the girl, it is the song of somebody who has long since accepted and made peace with his lonesome fate. And ʽMasters Of Warʼ, although it openly steals Jean Ritchie's arrangement of the traditional ʽNottamun Townʼ (even­tually costing Bob $5,000 in cash), does that for a good reason — its dirge-like repetitive struc­ture is perfect for a solemn curse, no matter how crudely leftist that curse may be (not that the actual lyrics necessarily have to have a leftist interpretation — a war is always a war, and the song does good by not naming specific names, preserving its relevancy).

A curious fact, rarely commented upon by reviewers, is that The Freewheelin' gradually lightens up as its unusually bulky fifty minutes roll by: starting off with the solemn and the serious, after ʽBob Dylan's Dreamʼ it takes a sharp turn into the lightweight and comical — the last five num­bers are a downright playful sequence, and the idea to put them all together was right there from the start, even before censorship forced Bob to drop some of the politically loaded songs (like ʽTalkin' John Birch Bluesʼ) and replace them with something less «actual». Of course, ʽOxford Townʼ is really about racism, and ʽTalking World War III Bluesʼ is quite apocalyptic in its basic dream message, but the former is still shaped as a humorous folk song, and the latter is a talking blues, where humor is an essential component. And the whole sequence ends with ʽI Shall Be Freeʼ, which already contains no social undercurrent whatsoever (well, almost: that verse about President Kennedy and what we need to make the country grow has always seemed to me as one of the smartest observations on 1960s society in general).

This gradual transition from the solemn to the sacrilegious is really the main thing that makes The Freewheelin' matter as an album — otherwise, it would simply be an early acoustic hit col­lec­tion. Not being too diverse in its melodies and certainly not being diverse in its arrangements (it is almost too easy to overlook the fact that ʽCorrine, Corrinaʼ was recorded with a full backing band, what with its overall quiet sound agreeing so smoothly with the rest of the album), The Freewheelin' has more emotional diversity in its overall 50-minute palette than Woody Guthrie (no offense meant) had in his entire career. Dylan the prophet, Dylan the accuser, Dylan the hardened loner, Dylan the visionary, Dylan the bluesman — and, at the same time, Dylan the social satirist, Dylan the snappy joker, Dylan the musical-slapstick clown. Too bad Dylan the surf-rocker and Dylan the smooth teen idol missed the boat, but there is a physical limit, I guess, on different types of personalities one can handle at the same time.

The album cover deserves a special mention, too — the photographer did a marvelous job of capturing Bob in a downright awkward pose, where he looks like an authentically autistic dude, used to spend most of his life in dark corners, whom his girlfriend just finally happened to drag out in the street to take a brief walk, clinging on to him so tightly not so much out of general pas­sion, but more out of fear that he'd run away at the first occasion (which he eventually did a year later, breaking up with the unfortunate Suze Rotolo out of general immaturity of character). On subsequent covers, he would usually stare at you with either contempt, condescension, or, at best, curiosity (at the general stupidity and backwardness of the human race, no doubt) — on The Freewheelin', he is much too shy to look you in the eye at all.

This shyness permeates the entire LP, as Bob never engages his listeners in bloody fights (even the vicious punch of ʽMasters Of Warʼ is directed somewhere in the open air, unless you are in a position to take it personally). There is, consequently, a thick demarcation line that separates The Freewheelin' from everything that came after it — the «certified genius» and «generation spokes­man» tags that were slapped on to Bob in the wake of the enormous success of the album had an irreversible effect on his persona, and so Freewheelin' remains the only fully original Dylan album to not bear the traces of this pressure. In a way, this is the only «pure» Dylan album out there, written and recorded by a shy, but talented little kid from Hibbing, Minnesota. Later on, the shy little kid was crowned king — and has behaved like a king ever since then. Young king, old king, active king, lazy king, acting king, king in (temporary) exile, whatever: he would al­ways be up there and you would always be down here, in some way. On The Freewheelin', he is not a king yet — he's out in the street with a girl on his arm. When would there be another time he'd allow himself to be photoed with a girl on his arm? Thumbs up for Suze Rotolo and her charming, if doomed, little smile.

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