Music Babble

Game Theory, Lolita Nation: The Great Lost Hipster College-Rock Cult Masterpiece Of The 80s...That Isn't. Leader Scott Miller replaced several Game Theory band members and went completely nutty with all sorts of experimentalism (sound collages, literary references to Nabokov, Joyce, etc., all sorts of subgenres, you know the drill) to create this wildly ambitious, legendary, out-of-print-for-decades, impossible-to-find double LP....that few people are really discussing in the hushed tones they're supposed to. Go ahead, look around the Internet--reviews and big long essays discussing either the album's importance or brilliance are stunningly scant (compared to, say, Zen Arcade, Double Nickles On The Dime or the similarly titled Daydream Nation) which I know is partially due to the album being miserably out of print for a long time, but there's been a reissue and you can just go listen to all 74 minutes of it on Youtube, and the video of the full album was posted six years ago and doesn't have ten thousand views. I can think of four big things wrong with it. One, Scott Miller isn't a particularly great singer--a nasally whiny sorta-sensitive guy who predicts some of the softer Elephant 6 stuff, which isn't necessarily wrong for an album of Big Bright-Eyed College Rock, but his vocals struck me as nothing special. Two, it's merciful that the band uses synthesizers sparingly, but whenever they do, like on "Toby Ornette" or "The World's Easiest Job," to name a couple, they're godawful tinny Casio crap. Third, as you can predict, the sound collage stuff doesn't work--go look up the track listing and prepare to gawk at the ridiculously long, fragmented "title" of track 22, and then listen to it, and...it's, uh, less than two minutes long and it's just three-second snips of other songs on the album edited together like a guy messing with the radio dial in his car. There are lots of other short tracks padding the album out that make no impression, either. Fourth (this is the worst part) it's got its share of filler, way more than the abovementioned 70 minute 80s college classics. Like "Nothing New," or "One More For Saint Michael," or others I could name. I guess it sounds like I hate this album, but I really don't--it's still probably more good than bad and I'd hand it an okay rating for the more important songs that I did like, though for years all I could remember (or ever relistened to) is the obvious power-pop tune "Mammoth Gardens," sung with high-school glee by Miller's hot girlfriend. I also liked the speedy percussiony rocker "The Waist And The Knees," the proto-Guided By Voices "Dripping With Looks," the cutesy "Chardonnay," the doldrum-y piano song "Andy In Ten Years," and the pretty closer "Together Now, Very Minor," which handily beats "I'm In Love With A Girl" by Miller's beloved big Star. So no, it's still got enough good stuff to justify listening to it. But man, I thought I was in for a legend here, and the primary reason I'm going to listen to the rest of Game Theory's catalogue is that I'm hoping it trumps this, their alleged "masterpiece." Miller (who made money as a software engineer, not a college rocker) committed suicide in 2013 and while that led to a lot of sad articles commenting on his passing, it didn't lead to any big revival for Lolita Nation, and as I've already said, not that many people were talking about it to begin with. So its future is looking pretty bleak. Have YOU heard it? I only recall Derrick Stuart discussing it here, and that was only once or twice.

Jethro Tull, This Was: I was a bit hard on this one in the past, and the biggest reason why was that it doesn't have a single mega-standout classic song on it; it didn't help that the follow-up, Stand Up, was far better. I don't remember how the song Mick Abrahams sang actually goes, but at least this time around I can remember strutting rockers like "My Sunday Feeling" and "Cat's Squirrel" and "A Song For Jeffrey," and decent balladry like "Beggar's Farm" (folk) and "Some Day The Sun Won't Shine For You" (blues). The instrumental stuff in the middle like "Dharma For One" and "Serenade To A Cuckoo" isn't so hot though. Still, given how much of a disappointment Tull's catalogue was from 1973 onward, it's nice to check back and find out that I was slightly wrong about their beginning. Funny album cover, too.

The Fall, The Wonderful And Frightening World Of The Fall: Pretty exhausting, but that's because I chose to listen to a version that lasted for something like 90 minutes and was padded out with like 10-15 bonus tracks. I'd have to look up to see if it matches with anything I read about in the Wikipedia entry, because this album has a reissue history mess like no other! Whatever the case, it was great to hear Fall-pop tunes like "C. R. E. E. P." and "Disney's Dream Debased" (what a sad true story THAT song is), or "Elves," or Mark E. Smith's "I Wanna Be Your Dog" rip off, "Copped It." I'd forgotten "Slang King," which isn't too bad, and at least from the bonus tracks I now know where Pavement got their classic "Baptist Blacktick" from, and it's "No Bulbs." (No prize for guessing which song I like better.) Decent album but I'll probably not revisit the whole thing again. I only ever heard about seven albums by this band and of those the only one I ever adored was This Nation's Saving Grace.

David Bowie, David Bowie (aka Man Of Words, Man Of Music, bka Space Oddity): Lots of people love "Space Oddity," but few have kind words for Space Oddity, including David Bowie himself, apparently. I couldn't find a single review of the album that was glowing, or which liked the album without any caveats or grudges. It's easy to see that Bowie's songwriting was not in top form here, let alone his very naive and youthful hippie outlook that he'd drop immediately afterwards. About half the album simply floats away when you're done listening to it, especially the overwrought 10 minute mess "Cygnet Committee" (which nonetheless earned raves from the AMG guy alone, for being one of the worst "hey, the hippie thing is about to die!" songs) But "Space Oddity" is great of course, "Memory Of A Free Festival" is a pretty great evocation of 60s good times even if Bowie was obviously aping "Hey Jude," "God Knows I'm Good" isn't half bad lyrically or musically and "Unwashed And Somewhat Slightly Dazed" is sort of a fun overproduced psychedelic Bo Diddley rocker, even though I've never not been able to laugh at the moment when the lovely rainy strummy intro gives way to the Bo Diddley part, a rocker so corny and contrived and fake and obviously trend-hopping in its sonics that I've always envisioned some balding middle aged British record executive looking at Bowie in the recording booth and whispering to himself "yes, yes that's it, THAT'S the music the kids are listening to m'yeeessss!" in a voice like Deltoid from A Clockwork Orange. I'm willing to defend the album on its general mood too--I really like all those strummy slightly melancholy acoustic guitars, a rainy mood Bowie'd never really try again, but sort of pleasant in its youthful naivete. Of these tracks, "Wild Eyed Boy From Freecloud" comes across the best. So no, this album will never be one of his classics, but I have a soft spot for youthful naivete!

Gentle Giant, The Power And The Glory: Although this isn't much better than before I'm glad I gave it a second try. I liked "Proclamation" and the pop-friendly (by their standards) title track a lot, which isn't part of the actual album. That's all I ever remembered though, except for agreeing with everyone that "So Sincere" was the worst Gentle Giant song imaginable. The two songs I remembered are still the best, though looking through it now, only "The Face" has nothing in particular going for it. "Aspirations" is a lightly lovely, very soft Kerry Minnear ballad, though it doesn't top "Funny Ways." "Playing The Game" manages a modestly catchy riff throughout. "No God's A Man" isn't bad for those who like the lazy mood of "His Last Voyage," though that song's a lot better. "Cogs In Cogs" races and meshes around in a way that irritates some but which I find memorable and "Valedictory" is an acceptable reprise. Hell, even "So Sincere" is at least a sort of museum-piece bad, something you just have to show your prog nerd buddies at the local arcade as The Most Eggheaded Song Imaginable from The World's Most Eggheaded Band. Not sure when I'll revisit this album again, if ever, but unlike In A Glass House it did get a bit better.