FOR THE RECORD COLUMN: Ted reviews some oldies but goodies Back to Apache home pageTED MCLENDON
Ideally I'd like to write about new music as it hits the market. Far be it from my finances to be so progressive though. As it is, my piggy bank's got shaken head syndrome and the postage on my bank statement outweighs the worth of my account.
I'm considering approaching the Apache staff with the suggestion that they provide me with a budget for purchasing new music. I'm also of the mind that they fund for a new laptop. Oh, and how about a personal secretary? I'm sure they'll concur I'm an asset well worth such expenditure. Until I've convinced them, however, I think I'll resurrect some older albums that I feel have been overlooked in years past.
Underworld "dubnobasswithmyheadman" 1993 Junior Recordings
Critics will spend pages laboring over what words adequately carry the definition of a piece of music, or a given work of art. With this album, one word will do: Volume. That's not to say that the word "volume" defines the album, but in the cranking of the volume dial lies the definition of this disc. Truly, the torrid beats burn all the more intense with every increased decibel.
Introspective vocals are demure yet captivatingly suggestive as they dance in the shadows of the fiery rhythm. Already the listener is intrigued when from above come luminous orbs of melody that float and circumscribe the heated sounds, slowly dripping their fuel on the flame. Perhaps the combination of such mystical melodies, intensely energized beats, and lyrics plagued with existential unease yet so raw with sexuality seems a less than pleasant combination.
Oddly enough, "dubnobasswithmyheadman" is strikingly gratifying. All the changes happen at just the right time and "dirty epic" and "m.e." will beg you to hit the repeat button. So dim the lights, crank the volume, and as Theodore Roethke said "everything comes to one as we dance on, dance on, dance on."
The Trash Can "Sinatras Cake" 1990 Go!Discs/London
It baffles me as to why this album, or band for that matter, never hit the big time. The entire record is nothing short of pop gorgeousness. Perhaps the lack of airtime has something to do with the inability to extract a single song as representative of the album.
It'd be like releasing one chapter from a novel.
Indeed, Cake is one of those albums that one simply cannot skip tracks on. Front to back, the record is a succession of necessary parts.
The gentle, acoustically driven "chapters" in Cake are rotund with poignant word play and charming verse. In the song "The Best Man's Fall", The vocalist sings "you came into my life like a brick through a window and I? cracked a smile".
And surely one cannot refrain from cracking a smile when listening to the harmony that carries such lines. These songs take youthful innocence and aged wisdom out for ice cream. In the refrain, the two glide into one another and simply stop to smell the flowers.
Stunningly imaginative and teeming with elegant simplicities, this is the soundtrack of daydreams.
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"We consider bibles and religions divine- I do not say they are not divine, I say they have all grown out of you, and may grow out of you still. It is not they who give the life, it is you who give the life. Leaves are no more shed from trees, or trees from the earth, than they are shed out of you." -Walt Whitman-