'Reconsider Me'...

Warren Zevon – Warren Zevon (Asylum, 1976, Rhino Reissue, 2008)

What a shame the long-promised Warren Zevon catalogue reissues have been so variable, haphazard and under-promoted. Last year’s reissues at least made ‘The Envoy’ and ‘Stand In The Fire’ readily available on CD, but there were few extras and little effort was made with the presentation. Similarly, a reissue of ‘Mr. Bad Example’ snuck out earlier this year with little fanfare and no bonus tracks. Scant respect is being paid to chronology.

This eponymous album from 1976 is the first to get more reverential treatment on its reissue. It’s often erroneously referred to as one of rock’s great debuts. Zevon himself essentially disowned his true debut, 1969’s eccentric and sketchy ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ (will Rhino manage to make that one available again?), so it’s best to see ‘Warren Zevon’ as the perfect introduction to his sardonic, irony-laden songwriting.

The Zevon story has been repeated so many times that it’s now been elevated to a legend. There’s his fraught childhood as the son of a reckless Russian-Jewish gambling man and a Mormon from Utah, his dysfunctional relationship with Tule Livingston (which went as far as producing his son Jordan), his status as a classical musician of some ability, having had some lessons with Igor Stravinsky, his work as Musical Director for the Everly Brothers and his temporary emigration to Spain when it looked like his musical career in LA had failed.

I often wonder why I’m such a vocal admirer of Zevon’s work when I’m so unconvinced by a large portion of the LA rock canon. I’ve never had much time for The Eagles and Jackson Browne, who produced this album and brought Zevon to wider attention, has always seemed a bit too tasteful by comparison. This record, with its unashamedly autobiographical songs, makes the differences between Zevon and his associates very plain. The Zevon story, whether it’s part-fabricated or the whole truth, makes for something much more snarly and sophisticated than the rest of this scene had to offer.

Having said that, the album starts far from Zevon’s own life with ‘Frank and Jesse James’, one of a number of classic songs to eulogise the American outlaws. The introductory phrasing and rolling rhythms betray Zevon’s classical influence whilst the story itself rings true with Zevon’s preoccupation with wild, radical, untamed individuals (a lifestyle he would succumb to himself). Melodically, it’s very close to another Zevon song, ‘Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner’, essentially a slowed-down, quirkier rewrite of this song that would appear on the ‘Excitable Boy’ album.

The album contains many of Zevon’s best-loved songs – drug ballad ‘Carmelita’, the break-up ballad ‘Hasted Down The Wind’, the hilarious helpless victim rocker ‘Poor Poor Pitiful Me’, the grandiose ‘The French Inhaler’, the defiant ‘I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead’ and the somewhat bizarre ‘Mohammed’s Radio’. It is, to my knowledge, the only Zevon album where he has the sole writing credit for every song, with no covers or collaborative efforts (perhaps excepting ‘Wanted…’?). Whilst the lavish arrangements and glorious vocal harmonies are characteristic features of Zevon’s sound at this time, the demos and alternate takes collated on the bonus disc demonstrate just how fully formed the songs were before the band even entered the studio.

This is the album that most effectively and concisely demonstrates Zevon’s lacerating wit as a lyricist and his mastery of the popular song form. ‘The French Inhaler’, so over the top it borders on camp, is, quite literally, an outrageous kiss-off to Tule Livingston. It’s difficult to beat a lyric like ‘Loneliness and desperation – we both came down with an acute case/But when the lights came up at two/I caught a glimpse of you/And your face looked like something death brought with him in his suitcase.’ Ouch! In the sleevenotes, Jordan Zevon admits he has to accept the brilliance of those lines, even though they were apparently directed at his mother.

The riotously entertaining ‘Poor, Poor Pitiful Me’, which puts its protagonist in the terrifying clutches of numerous predatory young women, has one of Zevon’s most ridiculous rhymes: ‘She really worked me over good, she was a credit to her gender/ She put me through some changes, lord, sort of like a Waring blender’. Towards the end of the song, it gets even better. Zevon’s next encounter takes him to a hotel room at the‘Hyatt House, but it’s too terrible to put into words (‘I don’t want to talk about it’, Zevon shrugs). The superb ‘Mama Couldn’t Be Persuaded’ tells the story of Zevon’s parents, his mother ignoring all advice and marrying the gambler Bill. He sums up his own predicament succinctly – ‘stuck in the middle, I was the kid’. It’s opening lyric also demonstrates his great talent for kicking off with a gem (‘Gambler ambled down memory lane, looking for a game of chance…’). He’d write a few more pithy opening gambits in his career. You could never be eased gently into Zevon’s wild world – he would always throw you straight into the action.

The album exhibits Zevon’s broad range by showing his tender side too. ‘Hasten Down The Wind’, one of those great songs about conflicting desires for freedom and attachment is wistful and beautiful and one of the singer’s many superb ballads. The heroin song ‘Carmelita’, both candid and audacious, is also notable for its tenderness, although the fascinating 1974 demo version on the bonus disc turns it into something unexpectedly ragged, bawdy and celebratory.

Musically, the album is something of a triumph, with superb playing from a well-rehearsed and proficient band. Zevon scored his own string arrangements and there are some superb vocal contributions from a stellar array of guests including Linda Ronstadt (who would herself cover several of Zevon’s songs, memorably role reversing ‘Poor Poor Pitiful Me’) and Stevie Nicks. The Beach Boys’ Carl Wilson provided the memorable vocal arrangement that elevates the wonderful coda of ‘Desperadoes Under The Eaves’ and concludes the album. Perhaps these grandiose ballads are a little unfashionable now – it’s certainly a very fine line between them and something like Guns N’ Roses’ ‘November Rain’. Some might argue that only their brevity keeps them in check but with such literary lyrics and elaborate musicality, they somehow surpass mere heart-wrenching indulgence.

The stomping blues march of ‘I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead’ might provide the least musically adventurous moment on the album, but it’s also the perfect context for this tribute to carefree hedonism. Even the half-heartedly funky ‘Join Me In LA’ provides entertainment and is a reminder that Zevon’s musical influences went well beyond the country rock of most of his more conservative colleagues.

Throughout his career, Zevon would make other excellent records and equal many of these songs but he didn’t release another album of such consistent quality. Whilst this may therefore be the Zevon album most deserving of a 2-disc reassessment, it’s perhaps a shame that the bonus disc doesn’t introduce any unheard songs. Six previously unheard songs from 1974-76 did admittedly appear on the ‘Preludes’ odds-and-sods compilation that emerged last year, so perhaps that seam has already been mined. The demos are intriguing nonetheless, in that some of them show changes in vocal phrasing and, particularly in the case of ‘Carmelita’, show how the entire approach to a song could change between demo and full realisation. It is, however, the original finished article – meticulously arranged and delivered with a devastating combination of venom and charm – that best proves what a superb contribution Zevon made to modern songwriting. Let's have reissues of 'Mutineer', 'Transverse City' and 'Bad Luck Streak In Dancing School' now, please...

Two Extremes: Steely Dan and Daniel Johnston In Concert

It would be difficult to watch two more different gigs consecutively than Steely Dan at the Hammersmith Apollo and Daniel Johnston at The Union Chapel. The former came with predictable musical virtuosity, as well as tremendous clarity of sound and execution astounding in its precision and accuracy. The latter was raw and untutored, unashamedly vulnerable and brilliantly moving.

Steely Dan haven’t visited the UK in a while, and this time they brought an ensemble that Walter Becker has repeatedly described as the best group they’ve yet assembled. This is without doubt a bold claim, but with the dexterous, driving drumming of the tremendous Keith Carlock and a particularly intricate horn section, there’s plenty of evidence to support this.

Certainly this was a much better show than the Wembley Arena performance I caught a few years ago. The advance publicity had lead me to expect plenty of recent material, including Donald Fagen solo tracks and some premieres of new work from Becker’s forthcoming second solo album. In fact, there was none of this, the band instead offering a shrewdly selected set of material ‘delving back into the deep 70s’.

The presentation was tremendous, with the band arriving onstage to open with a deeply swinging jazz groove to usher Becker and Fagen to the stage. Fagen played melodica for the first few tracks, which was a nice touch, and a refreshing change from his usual key-tar. ‘Time Out Of Mind’ made for a neat opener, metronomically groovy but with one of their most infectious melodies.

They only play two tracks from the past decade – an engaging, clattering ‘Two Against Nature’ and a tightly controlled rendition of ‘Godwhacker’. Much of the rest of the set focused on their golden period of transition (from 1974’s Katy Lied through to 1977’s Aja) – when they began to move from the fixed line-up and freewheeling multi-genre spirit of the early albums towards a more perfectionist adherence to strict time and jazz charts. In recent years, this perfectionism has proved stifling – with both studio and live bands forced to play rigidly composed lines with little free reign. Mercifully, this ethos has been at least partially abandoned for this tour. Becker and Fagen employed Musical Director and the horn charts particularly were meticulously arranged but they also left plenty of space for dynamic soloing and the horn players trade lines as if their lives depended on it (in fact, they probably did – Becker and Fagen are notoriously tricky taskmasters).

The show was testament to the duo’s longstanding writing talents, both as musical arrangers and as storytellers, with their surreal, hyper-literate tales of geeks, hipsters, drug dealers and outsiders. They also delivered plenty of laconic, dry humour too. Becker brings the volume right down during ‘Hey Nineteen’ to address the audience (‘it’s a lovely midsummer evening, and the last place you really want to be is at a Steely Dan show – you’d rather be on the banks of the river, with a beautiful lady…’). When Becker introduces the band towards the show’s conclusion, he introduces his partner in crime as ‘composer, pianist, songwriter, visionary and raconteur’. He may well be all these things but he still has the worst posture at an electric piano that I’ve ever seen.

Highlights included a stunning recreation of ‘Aja’, complete with Keith Carlock’s thrilling and visceral take on the infamous Steve Gadd drum solo. It’s also hard to overstate the audience’s delight when the band encored with ‘FM’, a genuinely surprising populist gesture. It sounded superbly slinky. ‘Chain Lightning’ is rendered as a particularly dirty blues, whilst ‘Bad Sneakers’ and ‘Kid Charlemagne’ made for pleasing curveball selections. The show also benefited greatly from variety, with Becker taking the lead vocal on ‘Haitian Divorce’ (with ample irony) and one of the backing vocalists taking lead vocal duties on a richly soulful, gospel-tinged version of ‘Dirty Work’ (one of the few forays into the earlier catalogue, there was no ‘Do It Again’, ‘Bodhisattva’ or ‘Reelin’ In The Years’ this time round). The closing ‘My Old School’ was particularly satisfying. The man sitting next to me simply could not resist the temptation to play air drums.

Daniel Johnston, by complete contrast, is not a musician’s musician. His vocal pitching is wavering and uncertain, his guitar and piano playing both lack any recognisable sign of technique or training, and his sense of time is so wayward as to be non-existent. His songs deploy only very limited harmony, often written in the same key and using the same three or four chords.

It’s not difficult to explain his extraordinary appeal though. His songs are among the most simple, direct and breathtakingly honest testaments in the modern pop landscape. They are frequently heartbreaking, and clearly a form of solace for the extreme emotional and mental anguish he has suffered throughout his life. He is endearingly childlike, but this also imbues him with a pithy wisdom completely absent from more self-conscious and verbose singer-songwriters. Sometimes watching him feels intensely voyeuristic – is it right to enjoy these manifestations of one man’s personal torment?

On the evidence of this outstanding show, the answer to that question is definitely a firm yes. What really shines through at the Union Chapel is Johnston’s underlying sense of hope and positivity. His songs address difficult issues, from unrequited love to his artistic and personal battles against depression (the quite brilliant ‘Story of An Artist’). Yet there is also real warmth at the heart of his work, particularly evident in the tender piano ballad ‘Love Enchanted’ and the unashamedly sentimental ‘True Love Will Find You In The End’.

There is real musicality to this performance too though, mostly due to the carefully structured nature of the show. Johnston arrives onstage to mass applause, beginning with a handful of solo performances, before inviting special guests James Yorkston and Adem to accompany him on a fascinating range of instruments (Adem plays mandolin and harmonium, whilst Yorkston gets an extraordinarily rich sound from his acoustic guitar). Johnston does his best to throw his accompanists off track, but they do an admirable job in keeping him true. They deliver spirited versions of ‘Casper The Friendly Ghost’ and ‘Walking The Cow’, amongst other songs from throughout the Johnston catalogue.

There’s then a short break before Johnston returns with another guitarist, introduced as a friend from the ‘songs of pain’ era. There’s then another short set where Johnston is backed by a full band, a surprisingly successful venture into conventional musicality.

Johnston is characteristically nervous and self effacing throughout, but there’s also a real sense of conviction underneath it all. He shakes consistently and violently, so much so that John Kell and I wondered whether he now had a physically degenerative disease to add to his other problems, but apparently the shakes are side effects from taking lithium. He sustains his extraordinary gift for communication throughout the show and he remains a prime example of how untrained musicians can break free from academic, formal preconceptions of what constitutes great art. Music shouldn’t exist purely for musicians – it should speak to everyone. Johnston achieves this with quiet dignity and integrity. In baring his soul so unreservedly, he challenges us to look more closely at ourselves.

OK, deep breath, this is going to be a massively long post. Working a night shift has not proved conducive to spending time posting my thoughts to the web, so there is quite a backlog of releases for me to comment on.

Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - Abattoir Blues/The Lyre Of Orpheus

What exactly is it with the double album these days? Oh, sorry, I mean two single complete albums packaged together. First Lambchop, then, err, Gareth Gates and Nelly - now Nick Cave, who seems to be experiencing a late career prolific blooming, has joined in the fun. Last year's 'Nocturama' album was unfairly maligned. Whilst it wasn't one of the best of his career, it was a more focussed and less impressionistic work than 'No More Shall We Part', and Cave was at least showing signs of tightning up his artistic control. The encouraging signs on 'Nocturama' are carried forward with dazzling results on these new works. Even better than that, whilst the intense rock blitzes on 'Nocturama' sounded more than a little contrived, 'Abattoir Blues' contains some of Cave's most aggressive and visceral work for years. 'The Lyre Of Orpheus', by way of contrast, continues his more recent preference for piano ballads, although it is worth pointing out that it is far from being a tasteful retreat into the mainstream. The dark spiritualism and predatory eroticism that characterise Cave's best works are still here in full force. Neither do the two albums construct a dichotomy between two distinct sides of Cave's personality. Both also contain some crucial steps forward and it is these tracks which ultimately elevate these sets above being 'just another Nick Cave album'.

On 'Abattoir Blues' there is the almost funky 'Cannibal's Hymn', which sees a tremendous groove gradually give way to a typically swelling chorus. There is also the awesome 'Hiding All Away', with its fractured organ stabs and interjectory chants from the London Community Gospel Choir. Anyone concerned about the absence of legendary guitarist Blixa Bargeld should fear no more. New recruit James Johnston, formerly of Gallon Drunk, lets loose on the Hammond Organ, and the results are a tumultuous refashioning of primitive, animal blues; brutal, immediate and brilliant. On 'The Lyre Of Orpheus', there may be a slight country tinge to the title track and the unusually infectious 'Breathless', although they are still tempered by Cave's gruesome vocal presence.

I had wondered if the addition of the London Community Gospel Choir might represent a somewhat obvious tactic, given Cave's well documented religious faith, and the fact that many other acts, notably Spiritualized and Doves, have already used gospel choirs to transcendental effect. I think I have been proved wrong, mainly because Cave does not seem to be aiming at transcendence here - he is trying to create something more earthy, violent and stark. Opening track 'Get Ready For Love' is ostensibly a gospel song, but it's a song of praise that is snarling and ragged, filled with the passions and rages of modern living. In essence, they have helped Cave reinvigorate his work and place his usual concerns and techniques within new settings. Another album along the lines of 'Nocturama' would have been affecting, but it may have not been enough. On 'Abattoir Blues' particularly, there is an energy that is both righteous and riotous.

Mercifully, Cave also seems to have rediscovered his sense of humour. Sometimes all the darkness can feel a bit weighty, portentous and foreboding, but many of the songs here are just plain funny. 'The Lyre of Orpheus' itself is a brilliant rewrite of the Orpheus myth, ending with these absurdly silly lines: 'Eurydice appeared bridled in blood/and she said to Orpheus/If you play that fucking thing down here/I'll stick it up your orifice!'
On 'There She Goes, My Beautiful World', Cave has tremendous fun with some famous names: 'John Willmot penned his poetry riddled with the pox/Nabokov wrote on index cards, at a lectern in his socks/St. John of the Cross did his best stuff imprisoned in a box/And Johnny Thunders was half alive when he wrote Chinese Rocks'. This strikes me as some of the finest amd most audacious wordplay of the year.

After the turbulence and energy of 'Abattoir Blues', the moments of simple, affecting beauty on 'The Lyre of Orpheus' are most welcome. The eerie textures of 'Spell' work particularly well but best of all is the quite wonderful 'Babe You Turn Me On', in which Cave makes for a move away from 'pointless savagery' to asserting the lasting powers of love. It may be a cliched theme, but Cave handles it adroitly, particularly in the touching chorus: 'The world is collapsing dear, all moral sense is gone/It's just history repeating itself/And Babe you turn me on'. The song has a natural grace and fascination, and immediately sounds like a modern Cave classic.

Whilst the Bad Seeds have seemed muted on the last three Nick Cave records (to be fair, brilliantly subtle on 'The Boatman's Call' and parts of 'Nocturama'), their full powers are harnessed again here to craft a sound that sounds colossal and entirely unforced. With these albums, Nick Cave seems to have stopped trying too hard and has started to have fun again - albeit fun spiked with faith, malice and more than a little sinfulness too.

Brian Wilson - Brian Wilson Presents Smile

This may well be the hardest review I've ever had to write. It's extremely difficult to comment conclusively on this lavish reconstruction of a work we all know should have been released in 1967. Finally brought to completion, this new 'Smile' certainly presents a major opportunity for some serious debate among the bootleg fetishists. Most of us have only heard 'Smile' in splintered parts, either through the complete songs that managed to see the light of day on other Beach Boys albums ('Cabinessence', 'Surf's Up', 'Heroes and Villains', 'Vega-Tables' etc) or through numerous bootlegs. Despite the reports of Wilson, his collaborator Van Dyke Parks, and musical director Darian Sahanaja trawling through all the original 'Smile' tapes, much of the material has been expunged, and a great deal of it made more palatable - or at least more realisable within the context of a complete work. There can be no denying that the new version of 'Smile' is an impressive achievement. However, I also can't escape the fact that it sounds like a loving recreation of an antique, heritage document, rather than a living, breathing work.

Cases in point are the new versions of 'Heroes and Villains', 'Cabinessence', 'Surf's Up' and 'Good Vibrations'. The latter particularly stands out - it feels tacked on at the end of the final (and most incoherent) movement, and arguably superflous. Given the course of events and the failure to complete the original Smile, 'Good Vibrations' has gained the status of one of the best, if not the very best, pop singles of all time. As the conclusion to 'Smile', it feels more like a compromise. 'Heroes and Villains' is more crucial because it provides a recurring musical theme for the project. It still sounds brilliant, bizarre and unique, but this new version really neither adds or detracts anything from the version that appeared on 'Smiley Smile'.

Paradoxically, this new version of 'Smile' is both fragmentary and cohesive. It is fragmentary because many of the individual pieces are puzzlingly brief, and sometimes still sound like unfinished bursts of creative genius. It is cohesive because of the way Wilson and his painstakingly faithful backing band have merged clusters of music together into three distinct movements, often using surprisingly traditional composition techniques. It's easy to pick out the influence of Bach, both in the vocal harmonies, and in the recurring piano figures, which sound highly unusual within a pop idiom. Equally, Wilson may well have immersed himself in the works of symphonic composers in order to create the three distinct mood pieces he has conjured together here.

The most successful of the three movements is undoubtedly the second, shortest movement. It seems to have a natural fluidity of movement, and a consistent recognisable theme, both lyrically and musically. It is this part of the work where Wilson's original aim of recapturing the inner child is most apparent. This is the part of 'Smile' that most adequately sums up the 'teenage symphony to God'. Its opening segment is 'Wonderful', which contains new Van Dyke Parks lyrics, and is arguably the most affecting moment on 'Smile'. Here, the quirkiness and extravagance is toned down, and we get a real glimpse of Wilson's gifts with melody. The following 'Song for Children' and 'Child is Father of the Man' merge seamlessly, with their cascading rhythms and overflowing harmonies. Whilst the obsession with childhood does seem slightly peturbing, it's worth putting it in the context of Wilson's endearing naivety. There is something refreshing, perhaps even maverick, about his quest to maintain thematic innocence. Compare this with 'Love and Mercy', a much later song which, although trite, can be similarly characterised. The closing 'Surf's Up' is familiar, but still masterful, and Wilson's decaying voice copes admirably with its cadences. It seems to be more his diction and energy than his pitch that is failing. His tendency to snatch at words that was so noticeable in the concerts is less pronounced here, but he still sounds crisper and less mellifluous here than during his mid-sixties prime. Vocal decline if, of course, inevitable, and occasionally it adds new character to the music wisdom gained through long, turbulent life experience.

The first and third movements are more confusing, although the reworking of 'Do You Like Worms?' as the more conventional 'Roll Plymouth Rock' is touching. The first movement, revolving around this track, and 'Heroes and Villains' is dazzling in its play with structure, and in the extravagance of its instrumentation. Wilson clearly remains a masterful arranger, and willing to experiment with a range of styles and sounds. The final movement veers all over the place and includes the comfortingly silly 'Vega-Tables' and 'Mrs. O'Leary's Cow', formerly known as 'Fire!', the instrumental Wilson allegedly once believed could actually start fires. It finishes with 'Good Vibrations' - a joyous pop flourish at the end, although it would have made far more sense to reprise either the opening accapella harmonising of 'Our Prayer' or the cool atmospherics of 'Surf's Up' in order to bring the work full circle. It is this section of the work that seems most bogged down in legend, mythology and history, and it doesn't quite manage to escape from it.

In completing 'Smile' - Wilson, Van Dyke Parks and The Wondermints have shown considerable tenacity and determination. It is a humorous, surrealistic escapade of a musical venture. At times it still, even today, seems slightly absurd. However, whilst it can still dazzle and confound, it doesn't really appear 'new'. This version of 'Smile' feels like a reconstruction of a masterpiece, and not a masterpiece in itself. That doesn't stop being moved, uplifted and touched by it though.

Tom Waits - Real Gone

'Real Gone' is clearly supposed to be another significant milestone in Tom Waits' lengthy and consistently excellent career. It will be accompanied by his first tour since 1999, and the first to feature UK dates for over seventeen years. Much fuss has been made in the press about the departures this album represents - it features vocal mouth percussion and what Waits has somewhat opaquely termed 'cubist funk'. In addition to this, Waits has entirely abandoned the piano. The latter is hardly a major shock, as piano-based ballads have been playing less prominent roles on Waits albums ever since 'Swordfishtrombones'. Admittedly, that the riotous clamour of 'Bone Machine' and 'Mule Variations' were tempered with elegiac and affecting piano ballads did allow for some light and shade and variation in texture. 'Real Gone' has to work much harder for a similar effect. Much less has been made about the similarities between 'Real Gone' and the pinnacles of Waits' back-catalogue, despite the addition of mouth percussion and some intrusive turntabling from his son Casey, there is little here that could not have been realised on 'Rain Dogs' or 'Bone Machine'.

Naturally, 'Real Gone' contains moments of madcap brilliance that only Waits could produce. 'Hoist That Rag' is deliriously ragged, with Waits' extreme guttural howl doing battle with the raw, Latin-inflected twang of Marc Ribot's guitar. Ribot remains an unusual and thrilling guitar player - his performances always in touch with a great feel for the music - a primal sense of the blues. We've heard the prophetic warnings of 'Don't Go Into That Barn' before, but the spiky plucked guitars, clattering percussion and screaming vocals remain a potent formula here. The heavyweight clamour of 'Make It Rain' makes for one of the album's more brutal and immediate moments, albeit one that recalls the terrifying growl of 'Filopino Box Spring Hog' from 'Mule Variations'.

Some of the ballads are intriguing - there's a sense that whilst many of these songs might have been performed on the piano on previous albums, on 'Real Gone', Waits and his band have fashioned a lightly blucked, country-tinged sound. It's a familiar Waitsian mode, but one that was not really at the forefront of the musical theatre projects 'Alice' and 'Blood Money'. 'Trampled Rose' is beautiful, whilst 'Dead and Lovely' manages to be both mournful and sinister. The album's key track is 'Sins of the Father', a lengthy and repetetive blues ballad, slightly reminiscent of Bob Dylan's epic 'Highlands', with densely poetic lyrics that allude somewhat obliquely to the current political situation in America. It's undeniably affecting, but it seems almost as if Waits was so proud of his lyrical constructions that he failed to even consider editing them. At over ten minutes at one flat dynamic level, it somewhat outstays its welcome....

...As indeed does the whole album. At over 70 minutes, 'Real Gone' is simply too long. A few tracks could easily have been excised - particularly 'Circus', yet another spoken word mood piece that neither adds nor detracts from any of Waits' previous excursions into this field. Whilst the likes of 'Shake It', 'Top Of The Hill' and 'Clang Boom Steam' dazzle on first listen, their polyrhythmic twists do not really represent much of a radical departure from the blueprint set by 'Bone Machine'. The songs on 'Bone Machine', whilst extreme, had more melodic interest and were, on the whole, substantially more engaging.

'Real Gone' closes, almost perversely, with an acoustic ballad 'The Day After Tomorrow', whereby Waits sings as a soldier at war, accompanying himself with rhythmially free, occasionally inventive guitar picking. It's a delightful song - stately and underplayed, with probably the best vocal on the album. Its impact is almost diminished because it feels like a moment of conciliatory respite after the visceral and confusing nature of the preceding 65 minutes.

'Real Gone' has all the makings of a great Tom Waits album - and yet somehow that is what dilutes its force. It sounds more or less what you might expect a Tom Waits album to sound like in the 21st century. If you are approaching Waits for the first time - you may well find much of 'Real Gone' to be radical, possibly even maniacal. For those already familiar with the back catalogue, it sounds like another album to add to an already essential list. Perhaps, given that Waits and his wife and collaborator Kathleen Brennan have already confounded expectations so many times, it is enough that Waits is still pursuing this relentlessly individual path. The music on 'Real Gone' has little in common with current trends or media obsessions. Whilst it would be refreshing now to hear Waits adopt a completely different strategy, it would appear that, in the words of a classic deep soul song, he's too far gone to turn around.

Panda Bear - Young Prayer

This is a curious and fascinating record. Panda Bear is, together with Avey Tare, one half of the regular line-up of Animal Collective. Not content with already releasing one of the year's most extraordinary and inventive albums with 'Sung Tongs', he has crafted this peculiarly intimate project of his own. Apparently inspired by the death of his father, this is a cyclical construction, alternating between strange mantras and handclap-driven ostinatos. There are no track names, and no deciphrable lyrics. I will concede that this description makes this sound either unlistenable, or merely very pompous. It is actually neither. Whilst I wouldn't go as far as to echo Pitchfork in calling it 'supremely accessible' (I doubt very much that it will get much airplay on Radio 1), it is a refreshingly tender and beguiling listen. At a mere 27 minutes, it has a hypnotic coherence and left me intrigued. It feels like a single composition with a single purpose, rather than a collection of songs. The guitar playing is delicate, and the vocal murmurings are appropriately fragile. At the very least, it demonstrates that wordless murmurings and wails can be as affecting as poetic language. It's very distinctiveness may mean that it's not something I'll come back to all that often, but I'm glad that I've investigated it nonetheless.

Interpol - Antics

I received a free copy of Interpol's dazzling debut 'Turn on The Bright Lights' from Roddy Woomble from Idlewild. He clearly wasn't quite as impressed by it as I was. Sadly, I've had no such luck with this equally compelling follow-up. 'Compelling' is definitely the right word, because there is something definitively alluring about the combination of Paul Banks' deliberately monotonous vocalising and the powerfully intense music that underpins it.

It has to be conceded that 'Antics' makes only the most subtle of progressions from its predecessor. Instead, it seems more concerned with refining an already winning formula. Perhaps due to their insistence on wearing black clothing, and the intellectualising tendency of some of their songs, much has been made of Interpol's similarity with Joy Division and The Cure. To these ears, a much better reference point is The Pixies. The vampiric Carlos D's rhythmic basslines give this music a dynamism and propulsion in much the same way as Kim Deal did for her band. The layers of guitars also create a striking singularity of purpose and distinctive musical vision.

The opening 'Next Exit', whilst a slightly misleading prelude, echoes the shimmering atmosphere of the wonderful 'NYC' from 'Turn On The Bright Lights'. It is an elaborate dirge, and may point the way to the band's future. On single 'Slow Hands', they seem to have incorporated some of the edgy groove of Talking Heads or Devo into their wiry post-punk dynamic. Best of all are the spiky, carefully controlled rages of 'Evil' and 'Narc'. This is a sound more involving and fascinating than the rehashed CBGB boredom of The Strokes or Razorlight.

Paul Banks' tendency towards dense, enigmatic wordplay can occasionally seem like random phrases strung together to create meaningless rants (although I must confess to quite liking a line like 'You're weightless, semi-erotic'). Equally, their compacted intensity may soon start to wear a little thin. They will need to develop more for their next record - but as consolidation, 'Anitcs' is a very fine sophomore effort.

More reviews to come soon - and I'm thinking of introducing an overlooked classics feature.

Smile? I Was Positively Beaming!

Financial struggles have meant that I've missed Brian Wilson on all the occasions he's been to London's Festival Hall....until now that is. Last Friday, I bit the bullet and bought a ticket just a couple of hours before the show was due to start. Perhaps familiarity breeds apathy (this is now Wilson's third stint of shows in London) but I was still surprised to find lots of empty seats. I'd heard plenty of reports of these shows being momentous, joyous, perhaps even quasi-religious experiences, but I remained sceptical given Wilson's apparent frailty. I have also questioned the merits of playing special sets devoted to one particular album, especially when your band is committed to replicating the original material note for note in a way that seems excessively precise and slavishly pointless. I still question this way of constructing a live set - but whilst, for me and many others, 'Pet Sounds' remains sacred as the greatest example of how pop composition and studio technique can combine to create pure magic, 'Smile' has more mystique. Wilson's breakdown left it unfinished back in '67, but both in its raw form and its new seamless completion as a 'rock opera in three movements' (no - don't make it sound like Tommy - an infinitely inferior and smug piece of petty posturing if ever there was one), it is both flawed and deeply fascinating.

Wilson keeps us waiting for what many still believe is his masterpiece. To my mind, the electric and acoustic sets that precede it are just as significant. The lights dim, and from behind a curtain we can hear a lot of shuffling around and murmuring. Then an anouncement: - ' We are The Pilgrims!' and a bizarre toast (Brian: 'Will we have a good show?', Jeff Foskett: 'Yes we'll have a good show!). The whole band (and it is sizeable, at least thirteen musicians by my rather hasty count) are gathered together on one side of the stage, clustered more like an extended family than a musical collective. The opening few songs have the intimate, informal feel of a campfire singalong. They start with 'In My Room', and the exquisitely arranged harmonies are immediately striking. It is a wonderful joy to hear this kind of close singing in a live setting - it is all too rare in popular music today. Many more Beach Boys classics follow, including a superbly jaunty take on 'Wendy', a great song that I had not expected to hear.

The electric set begins with a robust, enthralling version of 'This Whole World', one of Wilson's best songs and one of the highlights of the somewhat neglected 'Sunflower' album. The band sounded metronomically tight, but still seems to have an exhuberance and spirit necessary for a convincing live performance. Some of these songs, touching and whimsical in their original forms, become genuinely moving this evening - 'Add Some Music To Your Day' and 'California Girls' are particularly enchanting. A lot of credit must go to Jeff Foskett, an arranger and bandleader of remarkable skill, for he has developed the sound of this band so it is both reverent to the distinctive Beach Boys sound, but also alert and alive. There are an obligatory handful of songs from new album 'Gettin' In Out of My Head', which has largely received short thrift from the music press, but I felt the songs stood up remarkably well in such timeless and delectable company. They are warmly nostalgic and delicately involving. Brian dedicates 'Soul Searching' (a song also given to Solomon Burke for his recent album) to his brother Carl, and it sounds impassioned and heartfelt. It is followed by a genuine surprise, a sublime rendition of Dennis Wilson's 'Forever', a song that is simple in harmony, but devastatingly affecting in its result. Songs from 'Pet Sounds' are thin on the ground this evening, with merely a slightly botched version of 'God Only Knows' and 'Sloop John B'. The former, save for Brian's faltering vocal, is faithfully rendered from the original template, the latter has more energy. 'God Only Knows' is such an expertly orchestrated, brilliantly composed masterpiece of a pop song that any performance could not really do it justice - and tonight's was probably far from the best.

There is no doubt that Wilson's voice has declined. People in the audience mutter that it was much better last year, but I remember seeing a performance on TV and noticing similar failings then. He struggles to hit high notes, and sometimes gives up altogether, allowing his dependable and impressive band to carry the vocals themselves. What is most fascinating is how he deals with these limitations in the way that he cuts short phrasings and forces out lines. His style is less sugary now, and more aggressive, and it alters the way I hear some of these songs. 'God Only Knows' for example sounds almost possessive this evening. Watching his constant grin and extravagant hand gestures (he sits at a keyboard, but hardly ever plays it) means there is never any shortage of visual engagement on stage - and his genuine commitment to the material and interaction with both band and audience more than compensate for his vocal flaws. Anyway, the voice is at least clear and comprehensible, unlike Bob Dylan's. After a rousing, elongated 'Sail on Sailor', the band disappear for a well-earned break.

Then comes 'Smile' in its entirety. At the risk of sounding somewhat sacrilegious, I must confess to being undecided on the merits of 'Smile'. Bits of it are completely astounding, and it is all technically dazzling. It is undoubtedly one of the bravest attempts at extended composition in the rock canon, and with its use of vegetables and occasionally inane lyrics, it also has the benefit of a self-mocking sense of humour. However, it is also remarkably bitty, and the moments that work best are the by now familiar songs - 'Heroes and Villains', 'Surf's Up', 'Cabinessence' and a triumphant finale of 'Good Vibrations' which gets the whole crowd on their feet. It feels like an outpouring of consistently interesting but loosely connected ideas. The arrangement is deftly handled and the performance remarkably controlled, but I didn't connect emotionally with this music in quite the same way as with the classics in the earlier set. I'm amazed the any band could reproduce this complex work on stage. There was much instrument swapping and athletic movement across the stage. Nevertheless, it may not quite be the masterpiece I had convinced myself it was. It is a deeply impressive composition, but less convincing as a mode of communication.

Still, it's not over yet. Brian Wilson has to be assisted back on stage (he suffers from chronic back pain at the moment), but he still delivers a monumental encore that provides a peerless lesson in how to entertain an audience. Jeff Foskett first introduces the entire band on an individual basis (it seems to take forever), but we then get a continous blast through a number of surf classics, including 'Surfin' USA', 'Barbara Ann', 'I Get Around', 'Fun Fun Fun' and a glorious 'Help Me Rhonda'. By this stage everyone is dancing, and the sense of unrestrained joy is palpable. After two-and-a-half hours of carefully prepared, brilliantly performed pop music, I felt emotionally and physically exhausted. I've been critical in the right places in this review - but I would still place this gig firmly in the top five best gigs I've ever seen. It felt like a shared experience - which means much more than any hope of musical or technical perfection. The innocence and naivety of Wilson's songs perhaps demand a human, flawed performance, and whilst this could have been an evening of grand, perhaps even pompous seriousness - in the end, it felt like a celebration of one of rock's greatest living talents. There is a second encore of the stripped down piano ballad 'Love and Mercy', easily the most candidly idealistic and nakedly naive song in the Wilson catalogue. Had it come from, Damien Dempsey, it would sound dreadful. It is testament to Wilson's considerable charm and honesty that it sounds unfashionable, refreshing, touching - a Hollywood ending for an evening of sweet harmony.