It's been awhile, eh? Anyway, I've got five new albums to review here: Italian punk-rockers Verdena's eponymous debut, [the] Verve's debut A Storm in Heaven, [the London] Suede's Dog Man Star, Slowdive's last album, Pygmalion, and Pulp's This is Hardcore.
VERDENA - VERDENA - 8/10
One challenge in rating this album is that it's not in English. As a result, it's hard to know how meaningful the lyrics really are, regardless of my ability to understand them. That said, they seem at times to be very meaningful, and Alberto Ferrari's songwriting appears to be singularly abstract and disparate, creating a sort of lonely distant effect. Verdena also show a great command of atmosphere: "Valvonauta", probably the best song on the album, begins with a smooth wall of guitars and gradually becomes darker and darker, while "Bambina in Nero" is soft yet powerful. In this sense they somewhat remind me of Teenage Fanclub - at first glance they're just flailing at their guitars, but in fact are very calculated, and instrumental track "Caramel Pop" isn't half bad. Verdena have much more of an edge than Teenage Fanclub, however, and remind me a lot of Sunny Day Real Estate with Ferrari's alternatively smooth and rough vocals and their melodic yet forceful guitar play. Highlights include "Valvonauta", "Dentro Sharon", "Pixel", and "Bambina in Nero".
VERVE - A STORM IN HEAVEN - 8/10
A Storm in Heaven is not The Verve as you probably know them. No hints are dropped that songs like "On Your Own" or "Bittersweet Symphony" are in this band's future. To describe their first album as shoegaze doesn't really do it justice either. First off, Richard Ashcroft's voice is not a shoegaze voice. It lacks the softness of Mark Gardener and Neil Halstead, among others, and the music itself is much clearer. The music is complex, with it's mix of echos and ambient noise, but has a sort of rough quality that makes it sound more psychadelic than, say, My Bloody Valentine. As a result, this is not a very accessible album. It's not as hook-laden as A Northern Soul or Urban Hymns, and also doesn't have the obvious beauty of albums like Nowhere or Souvlaki. That said, it's still an enjoyable album because it's so complex. Hooks come and go, and bursts of energy flame up unexpectedly with reckless abandon. For the most part, I might describe it as Slint or Can meets shoegaze. It's bare, but it's still powerful. Album closer "See You in the Next One (Have a Good Time)" ends A Storm in Heaven with hints of what is to come, with it's softness and clarity. Highlights include "Star Sail", "Slide Away", and "The Sun, The Sea".
SUEDE - DOG MAN STAR - 9.5/10
Comparable A Storm in Heaven in many ways, Dog Man Star is a difficult album to get into for someone who is crazy about debut album Suede, because this is, believe or not, a big change from that LP. What made Suede so great was the way that songs like "Animal Nitrate" and "The Drowners" took rock and made it dark and evil, creating some sort of bizarro rock invented by Charles Baudelaire and the Marquis de Sade. Dog Man Star, meanwhile, makes strides toward earthliness, bringing in more conventional pop stylings. I'll admit, I wasn't crazy about it at first. Opener "Introducing the Band" is their worst track to that point (even factoring in their B-sides, which are fantastic; surprising to those used to bands who just release extra songs not good enough to be on the album as their B-sides), and the imagery Brett uses is just a bit more mundane in songs like "We are the Pigs" and "Daddy's Speeding" - its seems to lack a bit of the energy of Suede's debut and the lyrics are a bit less abstract. The music itself, however, is as fantastic as ever. It's not as gloriously thrashy as on Suede, where "Animal Nitrate" and "Metal Mickey" were seizures of sound, but, after a few listens, the brilliance of songs like "Heroine" and "The Asphalt World" becomes clear. The songs here are lonelier and more sparse than they were on Suede, and contain all the drama with a poppier framework, although not as obviously brilliant at first glance. This is a record that seems initially like a more boring Suede. This is an inaccurate assessment. Dog Man Star intentionally goes in a more pedestrian direction, but pursues the revisionary goals as Suede did. This time, however, Suede go beyond reinventing rock music to reinventing all music. "Heroin" and "New Generation" are, to be sure, a rethinking of rock and pop, but "Still Life" and "The 2 of Us" go beyond this, to rethinking music as a whole, fusing pop, opera, and show music together and imbuing it with the power of Brett's voice and Bernard's arrangements. What results is music of a higher order. It takes dozens of listens to get to the point of recognizing it, but Dog Man Star is a landmark album that imbues takes the depravity of Suede and imbues it with an even greater drama. It's definitely and album that has to grow on you over time, but you'll be constantly discovering new aspects of this album, making it incredibly rewarding. Highlights include "Heroin", "The Wild Ones", and "This Hollywood Life".
SLOWDIVE - PYGMALION - 9.5/10
Pygmalion is a perfect title for this final Slowdive album. I don't know why, really. Or do I? Let me think. Pygmalion carves (and falls in love with) that statue that comes to life, right? Well that statue is this album - it's permanent, it's timeless, it's perfect, it's organic, and despite being chiseled out of the very essence of music, it's alive. Just for a Day was a clear forerunner to Souvlaki: it had the same moving choruses and ambience, but the latter buried the former in Just for a Day while in Souvlaki this ingredients emerged fully formed from their chrysalis. Pygmalion rejects all of this, and also rejects music. The first notes of the album in "Rutti" set the tone: Pygmalion is nothing more, or less, than a perfect fusion of sound. It's powerfully monolithic and sparse, like being lost in Antarctica, or being the first animal to evolve with eyes and a brain. It reflects all of history and all of the future. It honestly is that good. I think it's every bit as good as Spiderland or Lift Your Skinny Fists Like Antennas to Heaven or any similarly abstract album. It's hard to tell this is even a Slowdive album except for moments, like in "Blue Skied an' Clear", where Halstead's knack for simple, dark, and powerful hooks rises from the depths (and then disappears). Check this album out. It's unheralded but incredible. Highlights include "J's Heaven", "Visions of La" (or LA, but my opinion of Los Angeles as an utterly uninteresting city makes me hope it's La), and "Blue Skied an' Clear".
PULP - THIS IS HARDCORE - 8.5/10
I've gotten really into Pulp recently, sort of branching off of my fondness for Suede. Upon hearing "Help the Aged", I opted to start with This is Hardcore and go back chronologically to His 'n' Hers. So, what of this album? It's very, very solid, with moments of brilliance scattered throughout. Jarvis Cocker displays his wit and humility in songs like "Dishes", "Help the Aged", and "I'm A Man", and the songs on This is Hardcore surge with an energy rising from calmness much like Pulp's previous albums. This is Hardcore is a much heavier, darker affair, however, than Different Class or His 'n' Hers. "The Fear" sets a standard of pessimism that speckles even seemingly bright songs, such as "Help the Aged" where Jarvis asks "We try, try to forget that nothing lasts forever". Even "Glory Days" can't break this tide, and This is Hardcore seems very much to be the swan song of an era, although Pulp would release We Love Life after the turn of the millennium. Highlights include "The Fear", "Help the Aged", "I'm a Man", and "The Day After the Revolution".
