Haven't listened to Guero yet, but judging from the lyrics, I'm guessing Beck has started to run out of ideas. Doesn't mean he's there yet, and I'll still give it a listen. I haven't yet heard a Beck album I didn't love, even if Sea Change is still too depressing for me to listen to most of the time.
I never thought I'd say this, and it pains me deeply, but Tori Amos's The Beekeeper sucks. I'm very, very sorry, Tori, and I don't usually say this without listening to the whole album, but I'm on track 11, and it's been pretty much all drivel. I somehow got myself to like Scarlet's Walk, and I'm even the person who defended the Smashing Pumpkins' Adore when everybody else was holding their noses and running away, but this...this sounds like it was written and performed by a tenth-grade Tori fan with braces. This is so bad it makes me want to cry. It's so hyper-femmy, you can actually feel yourself growing extra ovaries as the album progresses. This record would make Barry Bonds menstruate. It's exactly the kind of hoochie-coochie-smoochie stuff that I listen to when I need to throw up for some reason. The only place where the overpowering sweetness has actually resonated with me so far is in "Ribbons Undone" and that's because I have an inexplicable weepy soft spot for mommy-daughter songs. [I get the same way with Madonna's "Little Star."] It's cutesy, it's treacly, it's unimaginatively metered, and it makes me want to crap in a corner and drag my ass across the room like a dog. This is music by, about, and for, middle-aged women who are experiencing a hormonally induced upsurge in traditionally expressed femininity. If that's you, buy this, because you might like it unless you have a rudimentary understanding of the fundamentals of creative writing, in which case you'll probably hate it for many of the same reasons I do. If you're not a forty-year-old woman who likes bad poetry, strange pronunciations and mouth noises, put it down NOW--unless you really feel the need to support Tori and her family, who I'm sure are very nice people. I have no doubt in my mind that Tori herself is an extremely nice person, and has written tons of excellent stuff, which is why it pains me to write a review like this; but to be any kinder would be a glaring misrepresentation of the truth as I see it. This, too, I will still hear through to the end, even though I had to stop drawing and play solitaire instead because my frustration over the music was affecting my artwork.
[Update: The last third of the album isn't as bad as the first two thirds, which still isn't saying a whole lot, but it at least measures up to Scarlet's Walk. "Original Sinsuality" and the title track have some of the sparkle she's famous for, "Goodbye Pisces" is catchy, and "Marys of the Sea" and "Toast" make a good ending to what could have been a half-decent album if she'd 86'd about 1/3 to 1/2 of the tracks. It's still not worth $15 unless you're such an enormous Tori fan that you'll buy absolutely anything she produces, up to and including Christmas albums and recordings of her rehearsing scales.]
I did get a replacement copy of Arcade Fire's Funeral. I personally liked it, but I'm not sure how many other people will like it. It has lots of strings, guitar, piano, synths, and lyrics about parents, friends, graves and neighbourhoods. It's twee in places, but not to the point where you want to go wash the stickiness off your hands. Bowie and Byrne like this band for a reason: It sounds like it was inspired by them. Bottom line: If you like David Bowie, the Talking Heads, and the Smashing Pumpkins, you should like Arcade Fire. AF sounds enough like the aforementioned artists to remind you of them, but not enough to sound like they stole from them. If you're one of the two dozen people, like me, who actually liked Adore, you will definitely like Funeral and may actually glue your CD player shut once it's in there. [If, however, you think Bowie, Byrne and Corgan are a bunch of lousy hacks who have no business recording music, you're gonna hate this like the plague. If you have mixed feelings about any of the three, it's iffy.] There are places where it even almost reminds me of a stringy, acoustic Hüsker Dü. If these guys ever get a chance to work with Brian Eno, I will buy the resulting album no matter what. Shit, they almost sound like they have Eno in the band already, their sound is so textured. [Additional note: If you didn't care for the Pumpkins but liked the Cranberries, you'll probably still like this.]
Okay, I'm gonna go back and finish Beekeeper. I may end up bleeding from the ears, curled under my computer desk and snivelling for my mommy, but by gods, I'm gonna finish it.
same bitch time, same bitch channel...
Posted by Frida Peeple at April 4, 2005 11:43 AM