Top 100 Albums of the 1970s - #85 - Wire - 154 (1979)

They say that necessity is the mother of invention, but if that's the case then I would argue that boredom is its father. The genre of post-punk is proof of this. Punk emerged in the mid-1970s as a reaction against the pretense and excessive of progressive rock, but it only took a few years for the best punk bands to get restless with the aggressive simplicity of the genre, and began to experiment. Thus, post-punk was born, and few bands made the transition more rapidly and completely than Wire.

154 is the third and last Wire album before the band broke up. It represents the end of a three year journey that no one would have been able to predict the end of. Stripped down guitar rock has been replaced by cold and icy textures, with once reviled keyboards appearing prominently, wrapped around surprisingly tuneful melodies.

What's most remarkable here is the atmosphere. The dark and gloomy nature of this record sounds like a more intelligent version of Echo and the Bunnymen, as well as a precursor to goth rock (Bauhaus' debut single, Bela Lugosi's Dead, was released the same year, marking the official launch of the genre in many people's minds.)

The songs on 154 are unabashedly experimental. Rather than being build up around basic chord progressions or melodies, many start with little more than an angular chunk of sound, created on guitars or synthesizers, and the rest of the structure emerges around that one piece. For example, The Other Window rests on a bed of trembling guitar flange, with the lyrics delivered spoken word style on top of it. Indirect Enquiries is built on a two-note riff backed by a crunchy, percussive guitar effect.

At times, the band is even willing to abandon conventional song titles, with the first single from the album bafflingly called "Map Ref. 41°N 93°W".  I looked it up; apparently its in Iowa, although you'd never guess it from the cryptic lyrics. The tune is pretty good, though, and one thing I admire about Wire is that they don't sacrifice melody, as so many other bands do, even when they are stretching the genre to its breaking point.

Sometimes these experiments play out in a couple of minutes, and sometimes they are given more space to breathe. A great example of the latter, and the highlight of the album, is the nearly seven minute A Touching Display. Beginning with a clean, Morricone-esque riff, the song soon descends into somber waves of droning guitar distortion, almost abandoning form altogether in favor of raw sound. I don't doubt that this track must have been influential to later drone-metal and post-metal bands like Earth, Sunn O))), or Melvins. It's a thrilling willingness to throw musical convention completely out the window.

It's a shame Wire broke up when they did; given their trajectory over their three albums, there's no telling what would have come next. Just like post-punk contemporaries Joy Division, the band was perhaps cut short before achieving their full potential. Still, 154 remains a remarkable document of an emerging genre, and still somehow sounds fresh today.

Top 100 Albums of the 1970s - #96 - Iggy Pop - The Idiot (1977)

Iggy Pop goes New Wave! Five years after the furious onslaught of The Stooges, Iggy Pop returned to music in surprisingly humble, experimental way. Whereas his goal with The Stooges frequently seemed to be making as much noise as possible, here we find Pop at his most introspective, which is a welcome change.

In fairness, a large part of the album's sound is due to producer and co-writer David Bowie. In fact, it wouldn't be a stretch to call this a Bowie album in everything but name, for the songs here are remarkably similar to the early Berlin-period work that the Thin White Duke was exploring at the time, and two of the tracks, China Girl and Sister Midnight, would later resurface on Bowie albums, albeit in substantially altered forms.

Still, Pop is responsible for most of the lyrics on the album, as well as the vocal interpretation, and that's saying something. While not as accomplished a singer as Bowie, Pop's voice lends the tracks a vulnerability we haven't often heard before.

There's a theme I intend to come back to several times during this series: Fatigue with the rock and roll lifestyle. As the wild and raucous rock stars of the 1960s get a little older and a little more mature, it seems that an almost universal sense of emptiness and dissatisfaction descended upon them in a body. Lou Reed may have been the first one to make endless partying sound exhausting and depressing, but he was certainly not the last, and it's my theory that this feeling is a large part of what drove the energy of punk so quickly into the dark, cold world of post-punk.

Nightclubbing, written by Pop to describe what it was like hanging out with Bowie, encapsulates this kind of burnt out weariness perfectly. Nightclubs are supposed to be fun, but here they are painted with the mechanical rhythms of Kraftwerk and a droning, emotionless vocal. One gets the sense that everyone is tired and wants to go home, only no one wants to be the first one to say so. Similarly, Funtime doesn't sound as fun as its title would suggest.

For me, the high point of the album is China Girl, closing out Side One. While Bowie's more familiar version is more polished and well-produced, I prefer Pop's apocalyptic take, with the crushing descending bass line. In Bowie's hands, it sounds like a charming little love song. Pop makes it sound like the world is coming to an end.

Starting with its title and not letting up until the last track, The Idiot is a study in indecision, doubt, and regret. Coming from someone with Iggy Pop's bravado, it's a refreshing and engaging listen.

Klaus Nomi (1982)

Meet Klaus Nomi, an eccentric, flamboyant German opera singer who got his big break touring with David Bowie and decided to put out a record of New Wave music. Not weird enough? I should mention that he was a countertenor, meaning that he could sing at an extremely high pitch, and that the highlights of the album are bizarre covers of sixties girl-group pop songs.

This is one of those records that makes everyone who hears it scratch their head in confusion and when played for friends will inevitably elicit the response "what is this?" It's not an easy question to answer. As you can see from the image above, Nomi is not helping the stereotype that Germans are weird with his outlandish costumes and makeup job that looks like it came straight out of an F. W. Murnau film.

The instrumentation baking up Nomi's heavily accented voice is rather thin, consisting of angular guitars, some eighties synths, a little piano and the occasional smattering of backing vocals to evoke the sixties atmosphere of some of the covers. These include "Lightning Strikes," "You Don't Own Me" and "The Twist" all sung with the over the top melodrama only a campy opera singer can pull off (although whether he does, in fact, pull it off is purely a matter of opinion.

There are also some original compositions, which are decent and just as zany, but lack some of the surreal fun of lines like "You don't own me, don't say I can't play with other boys!" The album ends bizarrely with an excerpt of a legitimate operatic aria, which is fine but totally out of place.

Klaus Nomi went on to record one more studio album (featuring a cover of "Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead!" How great is that?) and a live record before sadly dying of AIDS in 1983. His debut is a fun listen for fans of novelty albums and general musical oddities.

You've Got Foetus On Your Breath - Ache (1982)

Jim Thirlwell is native Australian (now living in New York) who has recorded under many different names over the years: You've Got Foetus On Your Breath, Scraping Foetus Off The Wheel, Foetus Inc., Foetus Interruptus, and most recently, just plain old Foetus. In case these rather eccentric choices don't clue you in, the music (and possibly the man behind it) is nuts. This is the second full length Foetus album, and while there are many other great examples of this man's music, I'm rather fond of this one.

Thirlwell is nothing if not controversial. The red, white and black Soviet/Fascist inspired cover art would be a theme throughout much of his career, and it's as provocative as it is visually compelling. The music is no less confrontational, although there is a pronounced sense of fun that is largely absent from the industrial music of his contemporaries. And while we're on the subject, Foetus has longed been lumped into the industrial category because of his abrasive use of synthesizers and drum machines and the DIY, punk-like spirit of his music, but in truth the sound varies so much that any real attempt to pigeonhole it is futile. I stick with the industrial label for reasons of convention.

So what does it sound like? It's actually kind of difficult to say. Thirlwell employs a huge variety of sounds on his records. Cheap Casio synths and low rent drum machines dominate, peppered with horns, bass, the occasional sample and most important Thirlwell's hyperactive, paranoid voice alternately yelping and growling. The keyboards are commuonly microtuned just a hair away from standard tuning to add to the audience's discomfort. The pace is almost uniformly frantic and it will surely get your heart pumping faster, but Thirlwell steers clear of repetitive techno-like loops in favor of jittery, ever shifting rhythms and busy arrangements. If this sounds unpleasant, it's because I haven't yet mentioned Thirlwell's gift for catchy hooks. The songs are surprisingly infectious, and a ton of fun if you're in the mood.

Stylistically, the record (like all Foetus records) is all over the map. From the film noir atmospherics of "J. Q. Murder" to the intentionally obnoxious repetition of "Get Out Of My House" to the inexplicable fixation on the theme from "Rawhide" that shows up halfway through the album and refuses to go away, you never know quite what to expect. The highlight for me is tha album's final track, "Instead, I Became Anenome." It's such a bizarre, yet fun tune and the lyrics are exceptional.

Lyrics have always been an important part of the Foetus sound. Thirlwell excells at clever wordplay, punning and free association rhymes that come out of nowhere. Made up words like "antihistorectomy" are common as well.

So while not for the faint of heart, Foetus offers a guaranteed wild ride that, if it doesn't excite you, will at least annoy your neighbors.

Bill Nelson - Quit Dreaming And Get On The Beam (1981)

Bill Nelson rose to prominence in the seventies as the frontman for the British glam rock outfit Be Bop Deluxe, an excellent band in its own right that gets all too little recognition these days. After a five album run however, Nelson tired of the limits of guitar heroism and conventional rock structures. He dissolved the group and set out on his own to make music his own way.

Nelson's songwriting with Be Bop Deluxe was always quirky, but in the privacy of his home studio he quickly became much more experimental. "Quit Dreaming And Get On The Beam" is his second proper full length as a solo artist (his first if you discount the previous record, technically released under the Red Noise moniker) and the sound is radically different from his earlier efforts. Nelson has fully embraced the aesthetic of post punk and new wave, while still managing to sound unique and experimental.

The songs are notable for their catchiness and their lack of guitar pyrotechnics. With Be Bop Deluxe, Nelson's guitar wizardry was the centerpiece of many a tune. Not so here, where he prefers to tinker with synthesizers and twiddle knobs as a producer/engineer. It is as a producer that he really shines, crafting dense, complex arrangements for his tunes that make for a more demanding listening experience than ordinary rock production.

Nelson's performance style has also changed a bit. He has a fondness for angular melodies that can come acoross as abrasive and his singing eschews the conventional in favor of the kind of frantic yelping often associated with new wave bands such as Talking Heads. Certain tracks are reminiscient of Berlin-era David Bowie, where others offer slightly skewed, yet charged up rock and could have been hit singles.

Bill Nelson's work as a solo artist has been all but ignored for thee decades now, despite dozens of fascinating releases. "Quit Dreaming And Get On The Beam" is not the most wildly experiemental of these, but it is one of the earliest and paints a fascinating picture of the artist finding his way past the limits of a traditional rock band. The CD reissue contains seven bonus tracks culled from EPs and singles of the same era.

Lemon Kittens - We Buy A Hammer For Daddy (1980)

This is a profoundly weird record, and one I find very enjoyable. The closest thing I can compare it to is a less abrasive Art Bears with elements of free jazz. The band is comprised of only two members, Karl Blake and Danielle Dax. Neither of them can really play an instrument or sing, but that doesn't stop them from making some fine music, and not just of the "banging away noisy" variety. Indeed, they appear to make a sincere effort to construct actual compositions, albeit with limited technical ability. I would venture so far as to say that there is little to no improvization, which is a refreshing change for this sort of music.

The result is a lot of songs structured around simple ostinatos, with vocals recited rather than sung, mainly by the cool, disconnected voice of Dax. The sound palette here is impressively broad. Guitars are used sparingly, and over the course of the record we hear bass, piano, saxophone, electronics, flute, harpsichord, concertina, vibraphone, multiple types of hand drums, chriping birds and various other brass and woodwind intruments difficult to identify due to their inexpert playing.

The tone of the album ranges from hysterical to almost ambient, with lyrics that become increasingly bizarre as the album progresses. The opening track "P.V.S." feels like beat poetry over an almost funky electric bass line. ot too bizarre, but the next track, "Small Mercies," has Dax tearfully confesing details about an abusive relationship, while somehow managing to be funny. By the time we get to the halfway mark, Blake is droning the line "Afraid of Being Bled by Leeches" over a flute-dominated backdrop.

Truly a delight to the collector the odd music, you are unlikely to find anything else that sounds quite like this.

Art Bears - Winter Songs (1979)

Try to imagine a blend of angular, percussive guitar work, European folk melodies, Medieval tinged lyrics and bizarre Teutonic female vocals and you'll begin to get an idea of what this album is all about.

The Art Bears were a side project of Chris Cutler and Fred Frith's earlier avant-garde rock group, Henry Cow. Cutler plays drums and writes the allegorical lyrics expressing his political views, while Frith plays guitar and violin and they are both joined by the admittedly strange, but undeniably unique vocals of Dagmar Kraus. The arrangements are sparse, sometimes skeletal, with only guitar and drums (and occasionally violin) and this gives the music a somewhat brittle quality.

The musicianship is excellent all around. Few guitarists can match Frith for innovation both in technique and composition, and Cutler is a very skilled and dynamic drummer. There is also a good deal of studio experimentation going on here, with backwards vocals and tape loops both used to great effect.

The album's highlight is "Rats and Monkeys," a frantic experiment that is so abrasive and noisy, it's practically guaranteed to clear any room into which it is played. Naturally, I love it.

Winter Songs is a difficult record to be sure, but lovers of the avant-garde and people willing to put in a little effort will ultimately find it a very rewarding listen.