Horrorpop!
Apr. 3rd, 2006 02:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomusFuck me, this is terrifying! I've come by The Drift, the new Scott Walker album. Don't ask me how. It's on 4AD. I used to be on 4AD, but that's by the by the by the by. But the thing is, this isn't a pop record, it's a nightmare. It's a horror film, part Cocteau, part Jodorowsky. It's a donkey being slaughtered, it's a sudden screaming orchestra, it's Elmer Fudd jumping out from behind a pillar and turning into a cloud of bees and stinging your face with a million ghoulish obscenities!
In fact, at the first listen that's the main thing you notice. That things jump out at you, like jump cuts in a horror film. Completely unexpected things, things you've never heard on a pop record before. Everything is ghostly, drifty, abstract, croony, brooding -- and suddenly it all erupts into noise, sheer livid horror. Here, in the words of Robert Lowell,
One swallow makes a summer
The moon rises, luminous with terror
We are like a bunch of spiders, all clinging together in a corner and crying
Don't listen to "The Escape" alone late at night! You will die! Don't listen to "Jolson and Jones" while driving! My face is still sticky with web!
If this is a horrific record, it's also an incredibly bold and original one. The clarity of Walker's voice, the strangeness of his arrangements (he claims in this interview for BBC's The Culture Show that he doesn't do arrangements any more, just puts "blocks of sound" here and there) and the startling poetry he comes up with combine to make you think "What the fuck are the rest of us doing with this medium? Why aren't we treating it like sculpture, the way Scott is? There are no rules! Anything is possible!"
The only points of comparison I can think of (apart from Scott's last couple of albums, but even those don't pack this punch) are David Sylvian's Blemish, if it was crossed with horror film "The Ring", or perhaps some people in the francophone tradition; early Brigitte Fontaine or late Leo Ferre, say. To hear it the same evening I saw Barney's "Drawing Restraint 9" was simultaneously perfect and way over the top.
All is strangeness! Spring dies screaming! Art is reborn!
In fact, at the first listen that's the main thing you notice. That things jump out at you, like jump cuts in a horror film. Completely unexpected things, things you've never heard on a pop record before. Everything is ghostly, drifty, abstract, croony, brooding -- and suddenly it all erupts into noise, sheer livid horror. Here, in the words of Robert Lowell,One swallow makes a summer
The moon rises, luminous with terror
We are like a bunch of spiders, all clinging together in a corner and crying
Don't listen to "The Escape" alone late at night! You will die! Don't listen to "Jolson and Jones" while driving! My face is still sticky with web!
If this is a horrific record, it's also an incredibly bold and original one. The clarity of Walker's voice, the strangeness of his arrangements (he claims in this interview for BBC's The Culture Show that he doesn't do arrangements any more, just puts "blocks of sound" here and there) and the startling poetry he comes up with combine to make you think "What the fuck are the rest of us doing with this medium? Why aren't we treating it like sculpture, the way Scott is? There are no rules! Anything is possible!"The only points of comparison I can think of (apart from Scott's last couple of albums, but even those don't pack this punch) are David Sylvian's Blemish, if it was crossed with horror film "The Ring", or perhaps some people in the francophone tradition; early Brigitte Fontaine or late Leo Ferre, say. To hear it the same evening I saw Barney's "Drawing Restraint 9" was simultaneously perfect and way over the top.
All is strangeness! Spring dies screaming! Art is reborn!
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 06:52 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 06:55 pm (UTC)Also, how do regular schlubbs (say the ones living in rural Newfoundland) go about seeing Barney's movies? Can you rent/buy these things?
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 06:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 07:06 pm (UTC)I can't imagine anything like a mandolin appears on The Drift though. The idea of an album that may make Tilt sound like lounge music has me trembling in both fear and anticipation...
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 07:23 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 07:49 pm (UTC)i've been disoriented all day.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 08:02 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 08:20 pm (UTC)Absolute genius. I never thought he'd make something better than "Tilt" but here we are. No question about it, it's a masterpiece.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 08:22 pm (UTC)I agree and that's interesting because pretentious is a word that is often used to describe Scott Walker. I have to admit that I have always thought of him as petentious. I'll have to revisit him now.
I'm curious about the song Jesse. Read about it here (http://hollerif.blogspot.com/2006/03/rambling-about-scott-walker-elvis-and.html). The writer talks about America being "unmasked" on September 11, 2001. That's been a Click Opera theme recently and It's a pretty good description of what happened to the US on that day.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 08:58 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 09:10 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 11:41 pm (UTC)i always imagined he would be more serious and surly than that.
whilst i appreciate everything he has ever recorded, i must admit to longing for those glorious arrangements.
i'm not looking forward to the donkey death.
i wouldn't mind a whole LP in waltz time.
p.s - i would like to thank you for yr smashing contribution to the fotolog book. i was happy (and amazed) to be given a whole chapter (stringbeanjean) and was so chuffed when i found out you'd be part of it too.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-03 11:50 pm (UTC)I liked that, in the interview, he threw away the rumours of insanity and the inevitable recluse status. He seemed very sane and in control to me.
First Jandek coming up from nowhere to play live with both guitar and solo piano performances and now this thing comes as a welcome surprise.
When hearing the tiny excerpt on the BBC interview I came to think of another artist, Robbie Basho. Although working more in the primitive guitar field, he possessed a haunting and extremely beautiful voice. I can very much recommend pieces like "Salangadou" and "Pavan Hindustan".
Can't wait for "The drift". I liked your short little piece on it. Very enthusiastic.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 12:08 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 12:52 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 12:59 am (UTC)The difference is that I still love melody and couldn't eject it as wholeheartedly as Scott has. He gets away with it because his voice is already so beautiful that he can do torch without any tune to carry; I can't.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 06:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 07:59 am (UTC)http://www.emusic.com/album/10866/10866616.html
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 09:13 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 09:31 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 10:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 11:07 am (UTC)Yes we have no bananas.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 11:34 am (UTC)http://www.phinnweb.org/retro/scott/
Best,
pHinn
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 01:01 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 02:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-04 05:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-05 05:51 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-09 05:45 am (UTC)Friends come? thanks
Date: 2007-08-25 10:35 pm (UTC)dfdf767df