ALBUM REVIEWS
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ALBUM REVIEWS |
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Various
BUSTIN’ OUT: NEW WAVE TO NEW BEAT: THE POST-PUNK ERA 1979 – 1981 YEAR ZERO 15.2.10 @www.vanguard-online.co.uk
Guaranteed to melt your noodle if you devote too much energy to trying to classify each track by a sub-genre, “Bustin’ Out” is intended to be a representation of the post-punk era and is the first in a series of albums charting the way music changed after the punk revolution of the late 70’s. My immediate first impression to this album is: where’s the punk? For the post-punk we see here has very little to do with what came before. Gone is the in-your-face anger, and (to an extent), the message-first, music second mentality of punk, replaced instead with the building blocks of modern day dance/electro and pop. So is this worth listening to? Well, as a slice of musical history it has a place, but your enjoyment of this album will very much depend on your musical tastes and the way in which you can relate to what’s on offer. As I wasn’t there, I have to try to pick out the tracks that have influenced more recent artists, as well as those that show their influences from years before. Gary Numan opens the album with his inimitable style, and does very much give a flavour of things to come. Over the next thirteen tracks we experience several bands where all of the talent has been given to the vocalist, while the instruments are tickled to make accompanying noises (see Dead Can Dance, Bush Tetras); electro sampling and looping experimentation (Killing Joke have the same unchanging loop for the entire song – shame it sounds a bit like Popcorn); and Kraftwerk soundalikes (Moev and Tuxedomoon – who sound like they accidentally played two tracks at once). The tracks of note here are by Josef K and Suicide Commando, who clearly show the beginnings of recent bands such as Franz Ferdinand and Editors; Lizzy Mercier Descloux with her French-accented electro-pop version of Arthur Brown’s 1968 hit “Fire” and Material who, with the album’s title track, go completely against the grain of the rest of the album by providing an out-and-out disco track, complete with a diva on vocals and wet bass bouncing along the background. It’s not a matter of whether or not I would recommend “Bustin’Out”; it’s more a case of judging its impact. In the same way as documentaries about historical events are interesting regardless of the influence they had on you, this album will hold some interest for most music lovers. Would I play it over again to appreciate the music? Probably not, but that’s missing the point of this album – it’s a time capsule. www.futurenoisemusic.com |
