The Fall - 'Grotesque (After the Gramme)' (Cog Sinister)

This is a weird CD release because it pre-pends some early singles ('How I Wrote Elastic Man', 'Totally Wired' plus b-sides 'City Hobgoblins' and 'Putta Block'), but without anything in the liner notes indicating that. So 'Pay Your Rates' actually kicks in as track 5, and then Grotesque proper begins. Not a problem here - the singles complement the album perfectly - it's just that I only know what the song titles are thanks to my familiarity with the tracks (and the Gracenote CDDB database, of course). Repetition, cited often as an early Fall motif, is maybe most prominent here of any of these early releases - 'Pay Your Rates', 'New Face in Hell' and 'C n CS Mithering' (not to mention 'The NWRA'!) are insanely monotonous, drilling into one's brain with their back-and-forth soul-sucking. It's like a Michael Snow film, except with Smith's sneering lyrics providing a wild unraveling. 'English Scheme' has always been one of my favourite Fall songs, maybe due to the way that the carnivalesque keyboards blast over everything and the geographic evocations within the lyrics tweak my own fascination with British maps By this point, The Fall have evolved out of the punk thing entirely and arecreating something intangible but about their lives in Manchester. It's more confident, perhaps, less prone to hiding between Smith's bile. The keyboard and guitar interplay on 'New Face in Hell' is practically jazz. 

The Dead C - 'Tusk' (Siltbreeze)

When I first heard the Dead C, Tusk was their current album. I'm not sure if it's the very first one I heard, or maybe just one of the first, but it helped to define the band to me, early on, as a bunch of anti-music conceptualists. This mostly incorrect assessment (they were anti-something, but extremely musical) is largely based on the opening cut, 'Plane', which is not to say that I didn't listen to the rest of the CD. And probably also on the cover art, which is an eerie, Goya-esque drawing that echoes the minimal liner notes(a monolithic font, big bold letters, and nothing in the way of recording credits save a "NZ1997" at the bottom). It was probably 'Head's monster summation that really drew me to the band, which is actually a pretty amazing rock song that is constantly on the verge of collapse. Which, I guess, sums up Tusk nicely. The title track is the most free-form, though it bears far more resemblance to  The White House, Repent, and even Operation of the Sonne than to the Fleetwood Mac record I can't help but compare it to. Tusk is a really great collection of the Dead C doing everything they do - it's as varied and complete as Harsh 70s Reality, as you get the spacious, improvised soundscapes and also some bone-crunching vocal-led songs. 'Tuba', in a minute and a half, tells you everything you need to know about this band's songwriting capabilities; 'Head's second half would have to go on an all-time best-of (which, apparently, it is - on the Vain, Erudite and Stupid collection). But I keep going back to 'Plane', which begins with 7 minutes of rattling sound tape loop, oh-so-slightly evolving as it shakes around, with one regular variable-speed change to mark regularity. Though it resembles nothing else the Dead C ever recorded, it still shapes sound in space quite wonderfully, even with a limited palette, and feels totally appropriate with the guitars and drums kick in halfway through. This is one I always forget about, as it tends to be overshadowed by the earlier records, partly due, I'd say, to the repetition of songs across multiple releases, in different versions. This is a later Dead C, maybe now best called "mid-period", and the full-fledged ringmod AMMateurism of the Language Recordings era is almost there. Electronics are more present here than in any of the pre-Sonne records, especially on 'Imaginary', which is feels as much about urban decay as it does the wild expanses of one's imagination. This is the last release they did on Siltbreeze, so it's truly the end of an era, and what an era this was.

Blue PIne (Global Symphonic)

History will remember Blue Pine, if at all, as the precursor to Frog Eyes. I like Frog Eyes a lot, and I am intimately familiar with some of their records despite owning none of them. Blue Pine though, I remember far less about. I think I got this as a promo and enjoyed it as some sort of R.E.M.-Beefheart hybrid. This darkwoods Canadian weird-indie vibe is certainly an affected, acquired taste but it's not really anything too challenging - there's still guitar and bass and drums, and an adherence to song structures and singing, And lyrics even about love 'n stuff. But it's a solid release, and one that probably has a lot to reward those investing the time. I think when I found this as a promo back in 2001 or so I realised the potential and kept it around for when the time would provide itself. It still hasn't, and this post only afforded it one front-to-back listen, but I again felt some real tingles at a few moments. Now the gruffly tortured vocals are so constantly acupunctured by the guitar shards that it really takes away any comfort zone that might be created. But somehow, there's still the backwoods lumberjack sensibility that they obviously strive for (as the artwork and general name of the band indicates). You'd almost think this was horror-rock or some drunken ethnic/trad thing. Now, if lyrics like 'Raise your hands if you are a believer in a salad bar/Cincinnati, I believe you now/Woe to the father that was built on straight lines' (from 'Benjamin Windsor: Attorney at Law') are something you can connect with, more power to you. Personally I find it's just the right balance of that whole obtuse magic that Wallace Stevens used to do - and Destroyer (a fellow Nuck to Frog Eyes' Carey Mercer) is a modern master of. But if you find it a pile of pretentious shit then you don't have to pay attention, even though the closing epic 'Slowhorse or Traversing the Canadian Wilderness: Father and Son Search for the Elusive Mother' almost forces you to, through its urgency. I do think this is a modern rock band of true artists and they found a sound that is unique and accessible at the same time. Maybe this is just seen as Chapter Zero in the Frog Eyes saga but it's a great place to start. The keyboards and organs, a lot less prevalent than in the later band, give just the right amount of colour. I want to use the label 'Gothic' but that just seems a bit too easy. Maybe it's a forward-thinking retroaesthetic, or maybe I just can't help but think that way because Guy Madden is also from Canada.