Can - 'Ege Bamyasi' (Spoon)

I don't remember where I first heard of Can - probably mentioned in some article or interview. I do remember the first time I decided to listen to them, when I was chatting with a coworker. I was sixteen and I had a job working in a library. There was an older music nerd who worked there and I remember asking him what his favourite bands were. He told me that it was probably Pere Ubu (who I had heard of surely, but not listened to) and Can. To which I replied 'The German band?'. Latter that night I went to a Silkworm gig. Anyway I'm digressing again, trying to babble on about my personal history with this music instead of talking about the actual sounds here. Ege Bamyasi is somewhat of a watershed; things weren't quite the same afterwards though I can't quite put my finger on why. This is a much more smooth, fluid record than Tago Mago. 'Pinch', the opener, is languid and bright, though frantic; it's Jaki Liebezeit stretching out and letting everyone else paint broad watercolour strokes over him. 'Sing Swan Song' is simultaneously ballad and minimalist heartpulse. Czukay's bass is brutal and pummeling despite the soft edges, and Suzuki takes us to a new a place with his emoting. 'One More Night' I can't disassociate these days from the loop that appears as the backing track to a few Joe Frank radio shows, during which you can really focus/obsess on it's disjointed rhythm. I'd like to say that this is a dub approach again, built upon a long jammy riff with most of the changes coming from elements coming in and out - 70's cop guitar, cymbals, Damo's voice, etc. It's three tracks in before you realise that this is a new poppy side of Can, no doubt motivated by the hit of 'Spoon', which is tacked on here as the final track. 'Vitamin C' takes us back to the kinetic repetitive funk of 'Hallelujah', though condensed into three minutes and even more open of a songform. There's enough room here for Damo to get quite lyrical, and while his experimentation on Tago Mago is unparalleled here, by this point it really feels like the man is finding a new voice. It's a Can jam for a mixtape, though it ends prematurely. I always swore it was a lot longer. Irmin brings in a somewhat liturgical organ solo near the end, but this is the church of psychological warfare. And there's a segue into 'Soup', the most 'out' track of Ege Bamyasi. This is a tick-tock Jeopardy game, with harshly squealing white noise and electric piano bumps, all somehow kept contained while constantly threatening to rip itself apart. It's a rocker until it breaks into a more freeform section, sounding almost EXACTLY like an Area record. Damo is even affecting some Italianness (Dago Suzumi? I couldn't resist, sorry), all gutturals, sputterings, and rolled consonants. Irmin is going far more synthy than the soft organs we heard on the earlier tracks, and once again (like the end of 'Aumgn') we have Jaki pushed to the forefront. But it doesn't outstay its welcome (not to imply that 'Aumgn' does!) and quickly takes us to the two pop tunes, 'I'm So Green' and 'Spoon'. The former is an edgy jazz-rocker built around a nice Liebezeit/Czukay shuffle and some arpeggiated jangle. It sets a mood quite similar to what the band did with Mooney, though again with a syncopation they could have only dreamed about in 1968. By the end of it's economical three minutes, we've reached something chaotically psychedelic that I'm still not sure how to read. And 'Spoon' was the tune for a cop show, or something like that. Fair enough, cause it's properly suspenseful, built around an ethereal pop hook, laden in reverb and with haunting background vocals. Hit songs are nothing to be ashamed of, and this maybe manages to capture Can at their peak in just three minutes. I know it lacks the long-form workouts, synth/vocal diversions or instrumental freakouts but there's still something to be said for it. The sense of spacyness - not like Hawkwind, but like Alvin Lucier - is there, despite being a fairly busy arrangement, and while no musician really gets to go for it, there's the sense of collective brainmeld that could only happen when a brilliant band reachers their peak.

Chris Bell - 'I Am the Cosmos' (Rykodisc)

I am the Cosmos is such a hippie title, isn't it? And the song has wedged itself into my brain over the years, being the only real memorable bit on this collection besides 'You and Your Sister'. I'm not sure if This Mortal Coil is the reason I know these tunes so well or if it's because there are two versions of 'Cosmos' and three of 'Sister' on here - so by pure repetition they stick, whereas I can't hum a single bit of the other ten tunes here. Death was kind to Chris Bell's career, being that he would be pretty much a footnote if he had lived into the 90s making forgettable pop-rock records. That's not to be rude or suggest that he's without talent. Actually, I love these wimpy songs, like 'Speed of Sound'. Everything on this collection feels drained of energy, like the musicans are all knee-deep in molasses, coagulated blood or some other viscous fluid - even on the faster riff-based rockers, like 'Make a Scene'. Despite the super-accessible goals, it can't help but feel retarded (in the meaning of slowed down). I Am the Cosmos is a CD equivalent of a big bottle of 'ludes and maybe a few beers. 'I Got Kinda Lost' probably sums it up the best - even though it's a fast song, those drum fills feel like they're under autopsy. Or listen to 'Look Up', where the title isn't so much sung as moaned from the back of a dark haze. Bell's chimey acoustic guitars and thickly-recorded vocal harmonies aren't much of a progression from the plaintive, wistful tunes on #1 Record. Funny that his best contribution to Radio City is 'O My Soul', which has more energy than anything else he ever wrote. Among the dusty bubblegum there are hints of Southern sunrise (but not the whole Skynryd sound, thankfully). I wonder what Carducci has to say about Big Star - rock or pop? The riffs are just as great here as on those first two Big Star albums, but maybe it's too wimpy for him, yet 'pop narcotic' certainly would apply here. I'll look them up before I get to the Big Star records in this project. The aforementioned bonus tracks - alternate versions of 'Sister' and a 'slow' version of 'I Am the Cosmos' (even though it's only six seconds shorter than the original) should probably be skipped, or maybe you can program your CD player to replace the original 'Sister' with the Country version, my favorite. Does anyone actually program their CD player anymore?