Music: Arctic Monkeys - Favourite Worst Nightmare

Arctic Monkeys
Favourite Worst Nightmare
[Rock]







When Arctic Monkeys took over the world with the Best Album of all Time in early 2006, I must admit it took me by surprise; the brand of stripped-down, up-tempo indie rock ’n’ roll and trite social commentary practiced in their early singles certainly didn’t bode well for a great album. Those in the know revealed all, however, letting us all in on the big secret that, in fact, Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not was a cracking first try. Despite their record only featuring a handful of solid tunes, team Arctic Monkeys (consisting of the band members, their record label, the NME, Radio 1 and the most expensive non-existent hype machine ever built) made sure everyone knew Whatever... was a winner. Dissenting voices were silenced, skeptical reviews were swept under the carpet and negative media coverage was simply not permitted. And people say Kim Jong-Il is bad.

A little over a year later and they’re back with Favourite Worst Nightmare: a different, more mature, considered, polished, wide-reaching and inward-looking follow-up, surely? Well...no, not exactly. It’s still the same Monkeys we’ve been told to love, only this time with slightly better songs and a slightly stronger dose of the self-important machismo and blasé chauvinism so beloved of their debut. Jeremy Clarkson, eat your heart out.

Of the twelve songs on offer here, two are great, four satisfy and the rest should be condemned to the fiery depths of hell. So, while they’ve managed to double their previous success rate (only ‘When the Sun Goes Down’ stood out on Whatever...), the saving graces of being naïve, young, poor and misguided are unfortunately no longer on hand to assist.

Starting at the top, ‘Do Me a Favour’ is a cracking slower number where Alex Turner - for once not in his guise as a wannabe stand-up - muses on a previous relationship. “As she walked away / Well her shoes were untied / And the eyes were all red / You could see that we’d cried” laments the initially regretful frontman over a gentle guitar line, appreciating the smaller details during a short-lived reprise. The rolling drums kick in again before too long, though, allowing the song to resume its sorrowful tumble. The real high point comes two minutes in, however, with a striking change of gear as the mood becomes darker and the music heavier. Turner then reconsiders his position with the thought that “To tear apart the ties that bind / Perhaps ‘fuck off’ might be too kind”. Damn right.

‘Old Yellow Bricks’ is the other highlight, essentially a Long Blondes song for ninety seconds with its insistent drum beat and single note guitar line. “You can’t kid us and you couldn’t trick anyone / Houdini? Love, you don’t know what you’re running from” is the standout line, a rare example of Turner’s occasionally brilliant wit. The latter half of the song features some of the only experimental moments of the album as the Monkeys show some great musical chemistry, perhaps best characterized by the commendable incorporation of the Knight Rider melody into a truly hair-raising riff.

Of the numbers worth saving, lead single ‘Brianstorm’ is the best of the bunch: a funky enough slice of pure aggression that unfortunately thinks it’s a lot funnier than it actually is. Elsewhere, ‘Fluorescent Adolescent’ is a charming comment on getting old (“Discarded all the naughty nights for niceness / Landed in quite a common crisis”), though it does outstay its welcome. Eighth song ‘This House is a Circus’, in spite of being Monkeys-by-numbers for the most part, can’t help but raise a smile with the line “This house is a circus / Berserk as fuck”, while ‘If You Were There, Beware’, despite its terrible title, offers four and a half above average, musically progressive minutes which stand in stark contrast to the majority of Favourite Worst Nightmare.

The rest of the album ranges from inoffensively tedious guitar rock filler (‘The Bad Thing’, ‘Balaclava’, ‘D is for Dangerous’) to criminally poor, duration-lengthening ballads conveniently placed at the end of each half (‘Only Ones Who Know’, ‘505’) to the abomination against humankind that is ‘Teddy Picker’. “Let’s have a game on the teddy picker / Not quick enough can I have it quicker / Already thick can you get any thicker?” rails Turner against the ambitionless working classes. “Who’d want to be men of the people / When there’s people like you?” he continues, fist pumping in self-righteous indignation. Chances are, if the previous two lines haven’t got you seething, you’ll love the song’s no nonsense, up-tempo chug. However, for those of us who didn’t think ‘chav’ bashing was funny when it was trendy five years ago, ‘Teddy Picker’ should induce a snort or two of disgust. Sorry Alex, but any credentials the Monkeys had as a people’s band just disappeared out the window faster than you can say, “Two Big Macs please.”

All in all, then, Artic Monkeys have produced a predictably satisfactory second album. The music’s still OK, the lyrics are still smarmily unfunny (for the most part) and it’ll sell millions. There’s a lesson to be learned here, surely? 52

Music: The Arcade Fire - The Neon Bible

The Arcade Fire
The Neon Bible
[Rock]






Before getting into a review of The Neon Bible - The Arcade Fire’s second, epic, multi-instrumental showpiece - I ought to get something off my chest. Alternative and mainstream musicians alike have been relentlessly fetishizing the Iraq war for over four years now, ceaselessly bombarding us with details of how much they hate Bush and why the war is wrong, more often than not with toe-curling clumsiness. A quick glance at the lyrics on The Neon Bible suggests this trend is set to continue, with choice snippets including:

“Mirror, mirror on the wall / Show me where the bombs will fall”

“You’re still a soldier in your mind / Though nothing’s on the line”

“Working for the church while your life falls apart”

“Hear the soldier groan / We’ll go at it alone”

“Now the war is won / How come nothing tastes good?”

“Don’t wanna fight in a holy war / I don’t wanna live in America no more”

Don’t get me wrong, I’m more than happy with fuzzy Oberstian metaphors (see below), but preaching this heavy-handed is, quite frankly, rather off-putting. Whereas The Arcade Fire’s majestic debut Funeral focused mainly on human relationships and was underscored with some heart-wrenching arrangements, here Iraq - so often the reserve of the floundering lyricist - is the dominant theme.

It is also no surprise to learn, then, that some of the most successful songs on the mostly successful The Neon Bible hark back to older days. Live favourite ‘No Cars Go’ has been hanging around for some time now and, rather than lingering like a bad smell, the aura of Funeral gives it a definite sweetness. You know the score - drums, accordions, strings and trumpets swim together effortlessly as Win Butler and Régine Chassagne lay down their manifesto with dizzied yelps: “We know a place where no cars go / Between the click of the light and the start of the dream…women and children, let’s go!” Its six minutes manage to recapture the relentless momentum of ‘Rebellion (Lies)’ and ‘Power Out’ with the closing, choral-backed instrumental burst being particularly impressive.

Also recalling past glories is the first ninety seconds of two-part blockbuster ‘Black Wave / Bad Vibrations’, an irresistibly charming, bi-lingual, percussion- and voice-led shimmer awash with the childlike enthusiasm of Régine and Sarah Neufield. “We’ll make it if we run / Run from the memory / Je nage, mais les sonts me suivent” they sing, shedding light on the other recurring theme of the record: water.

For some reason or another, very possibly climate change (the new Iraq?), The Arcade Fire are obsessed with the seas, swimming, drowning, being submerged and other water-related peculiarities on The Neon Bible. It is certainly a commendable fixation, arguably best explored on the apocalyptic ‘Windowsill’. A Kaczynskian denouncement of recent human ‘advances’, it defiantly resists the urge to comply while a sinister, plucked guitar dangles menacingly: “Don’t want it faster, I don’t want it free…Don’t wanna give ‘em my name and address / Don’t wanna see what happens next…’Cause the tide is high and it’s rising still”. After a couple of combustible minutes the song finally surfaces as strings come in, the voices get a bit shakier and crescendos abound, all while the line “Don’t wanna see it at my windowsill” is wailed by every member of the septet for a considerable duration. Gloomy stuff, non?

More of the see-through stuff comes in the baroque thump of lead single ‘Black Mirror’ (“I walked down to the ocean / After waking from a nightmare”), the guitar-heavy ‘The Well and the Lighthouse’ (“So down I fell into the water black”), the brooding whisper that is ‘Ocean of Noise’ (“In an ocean of noise / I first heard your voice”) and the more up-tempo, poppy number ‘Keep the Car Running’ (Can’t swim across a river so deep”). While never becoming dull, the over-reliance on the water theme does draw attention to some fleeting references to the band’s more interesting politics. Even though I disagree with both of the bands other messages - abortion is indefensible (“Now who here among us still believes in choice? Not I”, “Why did I take the pill?”), the state should get lost (“Shot by a security camera”, the name and address reference in ‘Windowsill’) - it is encouraging to see such directness from the, Iraq aside, seemingly depoliticized mainstream indie scene.

Though the aforementioned tunes see The Arcade Fire in the steady, 8/10 mode they have seemingly mastered so easily, The Neon Bible’s two standout tracks see the band move into a different gear altogether. Essentially a hymn, fourth song ‘Intervention’ has, fittingly, music to die for. Starting with bone-chilling organ chords, strummed guitar and occasional brushes of the humble triangle, the stage is certainly set for a stunning song. After a couple of minutes drums and strings flesh it out further, before the choral shrieks of Régine and Sarah are again put to good use. It is such a great shame, then, that much of the song’s lyrical content is focussed on you-know-what. For such a spellbinding musical achievement, however, I’m willing to overlook some of the words. In any case, Win delivers them with such teary-eyed vulnerability that he could be singing about toothpaste and still be assured of shivers down spines.

The other highlight of The Neon Bible is the band’s grandiose rant against anything and everything, ‘[Antichrist Television Blues]’. Though it could be argued that the brackets aren’t exactly essential, the song itself is, bringing together everything that has so far made The Arcade Fire a household name: angelic, undulating backing vocals; Win getting angry; a toe-tapping guitar and drum progression; strings on demand; crescendos and refrains in equal, innumerable measure; unashamed Biblical overtones; someone attacking a piano. If this is The Arcade Fire by numbers, I for one will keep score.

The only obvious sour notes on The Neon Bible are the two minutes of underwhelming, plodding title track and momentum-sapping concluder ‘My Heart Is a Cage’. While the former is undoubtedly a poor song, the latter may have worked if not placed after such a tailor-made album closer in ‘No Cars Go’. As it is, I could do without it.

Aside from those two missteps, The Neon Bible is an exceptionally strong album musically. It could be better lyrically, but then that would be like asking Bob Dylan to go a bit faster or telling Beastie Boys get a bit more serious. The OK Computers, Marquee Moons and If You’re Feeling Sinisters of this world are few and far between and, while The Arcade Fire are prone to the odd ham-fisted or clichéd observation, they are first and foremost an exceptional musical outfit. For that, and perhaps that alone, we should be very grateful. 84

Film: Dir. Alejandro Jodorowsky - El Topo

Dir. Alejandro Jodorowsky
El Topo
[Western/Drama/Horror]






The plot: El Topo (Jodorowsky) happens across a horrendous, bloody mess in a remote town. With no clues as to who is responsible, he sets off into the mountains with his son to search for the culprit(s). Lots of crazy shit then proceeds to happen.

Re-released after more than thirty years of legal wrangling, Alejandro Jodorowsky’s cult favourite, El Topo (The Mole), is a hit and miss affair. At once a traditional cowboy tale, blazing satire, unrelenting gore-fest and sketchy moral guidebook, the only certainty with El Topo is that it’s practically impossible to understanding everything the first time through; choppy editing, random cuts, on-screen riddles and apparent character hallucinations all try their utmost to confuse the viewer in what has to be, if nothing else, one of the most bizarre films I have seen in a long time.

Visually it is outstanding, with Jodorowsky’s lens perfectly capturing the baking heat and vastness of an unnamed desert location. The obscurity of the place in itself is often unsettling, featuring a disquieting bunch of misfits (one character consists of two men strapped together, one with no arms and one with no legs), countless dead animals (including gruesome close ups of a skinned, crucified goat and a disembowelled dog, not to mention hundreds of dead rabbits) and buckets of blood waiting to be spilled at every opportunity. Aside from a handful of aesthetic missteps - due, no doubt, to budgetary restrictions - the atmosphere of El Topo is fantastically disturbing.

Where it falls down quite badly is the plot which, though closely adhering to an interesting Biblical allegory becomes an incoherent mess after the first hour. Without revealing too much, after El Topo completes his initial task, he passes out and is transported to a completely different location, subsequently being tasked with a completely different objective. Now, though I’m often turned off by the unnecessary handholding in most British and American mainstream flicks, a little explanation wouldn’t have gone amiss, especially considering the second half is also stylistically and dramatically inferior to the gripping, more character-driven first.

That said, the frequent surrealism is actually managed terrifically by Jodorowsky, never threatening to undermine or override the main action. The acting is also top notch for such a low budget movie, especially considering many of the leads are relative unknowns and much of the supporting cast were chosen primarily because of their physical idiosyncrasies (you’ll see).

On the whole, though overly frequent morality checks and the apparent loss of direction do weigh heavily against El Topo, its overall craziness, jet-black heart and dazzling cinematography ensure that it’s definitely worth a watch. 73

Games: Square Enix - Final Fantasy XII

Square Enix
Final Fantasy XII
[Role-Playing Game]

Square Enix’s Final Fantasy series is, arguably, the reason Sony has managed to maintain its lead in the console market all these years. While Nintendo’s steady demise was instigated by a mixture of self-inflicted design flaws (cartridges instead of CDs, that controller) and catalysed by a weak selection of killer titles (Zelda, Mario, Goldeneye and…um…a Resident Evil remake), Microsoft’s Xbox has earned itself a considerable fan base. And with the Playstation’s increasingly reliable Grand Theft Auto series defecting, it looked at one point as though Gates and friends were going to take the lead.

Alas it was not to be, however, and it appears the reason many have resisted the urge to invest in a 360, disk scratching issues notwithstanding, is the wait for the much-anticipated twelfth installment. Just to put the series’ popularity in perspective, Final Fantasy X sold five million copies (making it one of the twenty best selling video games of all time), and was recently voted the Japanese public’s favourite game of all time in Famitsu. Even the game’s short, rushed, confused and nonsensical semi-sequel, Final Fantasy X-2, managed to shift three million units worldwide. Now that’s what I call market influence.

And thus we come to the inevitable question – has the five year wait been worth it? In short, yes. All the main Final Fantasy titles come with hours of game time and tons of side quests, making them, if nothing else, excellent value for money.

However, one of the main issues I had with FFX was a worryingly Kojima-esque trend to make the game as much like a movie as possible. Cutscenes positively littered the first ten hours, suffocating any sense of momentum and introducing us to some of the most unlikable characters yet seen in the series. Thankfully, the whole experience lasted in excess of 150 hours, making the initial slog forgivable in the context of an (eventually) well-realised, pleasantly convoluted story, the series’ best combat system and an obscene amount of extras.

Despite the aforementioned strengths, though, it was all a bit too serious for my liking. Sure, there were mini-games aplenty, but accompanying them was a distinct lack of the quirky Asian humour fans have come to love. Like FF8, it was all a bit too whiny and self-important, crucially forgetting that, in a nutshell, it was still a traditional RPG where players loot villages, kill dragons, cast spells and adventure in tightly-structured manner.

Thankfully, the team at Square Enix appears to have acknowledged the series’ limitations and opted for a much more light-hearted approach in FFXII, the last of the series to be produced for the current ‘generation’. It could be the race of bunny girls, the tigers with Indian accents or the alligators hailing straight from the streets of Kingston (or even an interesting combination of all three), but the game’s wackiness is sure to please even the most hard-nosed of gamers.

Instead of the (admittedly compelling) life and death musing from the last game, the plot has been toned down somewhat and is, to put it mildly, extremely basic. And this is surely a good thing, given the more free-roaming nature of the game. Fortunately, that doesn’t mean another urban crime-’em-up, though, just that the game takes place in a world which is fully traversable. A happy medium has been struck between the fully open-ended world maps of the earlier games and FFX’s disjointed, menu-accessed locations and, while this does mean the player can potentially wander into level sixty monsters in the first hour of play, it’s a risk worth taking when recalling the horribly claustrophobic kingdom of Spira.

One obvious downside of the new approach is that, at times, the story’s grip on the player can tend to loosen. For instance, the player can partake in a number of optional monster hunts that, if attempted immediately, provide a satisfying challenge. These hunts can take up to an hour of game time to complete and, considering that up to five may become available at once, some involve puzzle solving and a handful are punishingly difficult, it’s easy to see how Vaan’s tale can become lost in the wilderness. That said, the plot is essentially this: an evil man is doing something evil that will enable him to rule world with an evil hand and must be stopped because he’s evil, so it’s pretty easy to get back on board after some voluntary questing.

The new combat system, taking place in real-time without a transition between exploring and battle modes, has attracted much attention, but it really isn't that much of an improvement. Instead of the more tactical and lengthy battles veterans have become accustomed to, battles mostly take the form of a three-pronged charge and lots of sword swinging (handled automatically by the 'gambit' system). You might get the odd bit of magick cast here and there, but why bother when you can defeat most enemies in half the time with simple physical attacks and the occasional cure spell?

Boss battles are notably poor, especially with the bigger foes; for the length of some fights, the restricting over-the-shoulder camera perspective shows two of our heroes chipping away at a pair of feet while someone off-screen is getting slowly beaten to death. Also, the inclusion of 'quickenings' – super special combo attacks that can annihilate some bosses in a single hit – is also extremely questionable.

And forgive me if this sounds a little picky, but is there actually a difference between wandering around an area fighting random battles and exploring a dungeon fighting battles against randomly placed enemies? Newcomers to the series (or console RPG gaming in general) often bemoan the random battle culture, and the developers have clearly listened to this voice, opting for a system which is aesthetically modern and highly simplified, but whose bare bones are essentially unchanged. While this could have led to them pleasing both sets of fans, I fear it has the potential to backfire and satisfy no-one.

Putting all the criticism in perspective, however, it would be wrong to suggest that FFXII is one to avoid. It is suitably epic, charmingly quirky, stuffed with content, polished to perfection and, for the first time in a long time, has some highly memorable characters and great dialogue. Even the noticeable flaws and abrupt ending to the story fail to prevent it from being a quality title, though it's far from the masterpiece that some will inevitably claim it is. In a similar vein to FFIX's role before FFX, FFXII is clearly acting as a stopgap before the star-spangled next-gen onslaught of FFXIII, but it's no doubt one that's sure to rake in the cash.

In a nutshell, FFXII is well worth a purchase. Well, unless you're on a tight budget, in which case buy Dragon Quest instead. 80

Music: Bright Eyes - Cassadaga

Bright Eyes
Cassadaga + Four Winds EP + Extras
[ Rock ]







As resident Conor Oberst devotee, my judgment may rightly be questioned every time I review the Omaha-based folk-emo-punk-rock-country troubadour's releases. But I can tell you one thing right now, which is as close to a solid fact as you are going to get in the subjective world of music journalism;

The track listing on Cassadaga is seriously fucked up. More on that story later.

The first thing you'll notice about Cassadaga is the gorgeous packaging. The white-noise pages of the leaflet reveal hidden pictures and messages when passed over with the included "spectral de coder" device. Special praise is due to Zack Nipper, Saddle Creek's resident designer, for a gimmick both entertaining and in keeping with the album's otherwordly themes (Cassadaga is a Florida spiritualist camp Oberst visited briefly.) In the album itself, things start off strongly; the mutterings of a psychic lady set over an ambient collage; the kind of stunt Oberst and his band (Bright Eyes now includes permanent members Nate Walcott and producer Mike Mogis as well as the frontman and an ever changing roster of helpers) pull off frequently, and it always portends something big. The melancholy, cynical beauty of opener Clairaudients (Kill Or Be Killed), when it starts in earnest, is magnificent; "Future Markets, Holy Wars / Been tried ten thousand times before / If you think that God is keeping score, Hooray!". After the opener, in kicks an explosive change of pace with the fiddle-led single Four Winds. The lyrics are as sharp as ever "The squatters made a mural of a Mexican girl / With fifteen cans of spraypaint in a chemical swirl / She's standing in the ashes at the end of the world / Four winds blowing through her hair ... The Bible's blind, the Torah's deaf, the Qu'ran is mute / If you burn them all together you get close to the truth". And there was Conor promising to make a non-political album.

The treats continue with the mature, cathartic If The Brakeman Turns My Way, some glorious harmonies combining with the repeated emphasis of "leveling out"; "First a mother bathes her child then the other way around / The scales always find a way to level out." Lest we be filled with too much of a warm, fuzzy feeling at the end of the track, Oberst bookends it with the biblical squall of Hot Knives and it's uplifting conclusion; "So let us rejoice / In all this pink noise / An oscillation / That we can pinpoint"

Make A Plan To Love Me marks a new experiment for Oberst; mellow. Yes, the songwriter who once invented a fictional baby brother that drowned in a bathtub is crooning like Sinatra (well, almost), about a career woman who doesn't have the time to love him. It's a unique pop gem, then, if an atypical offering.

He's not retreated from introspective self-loathing, though, as the scathingly witty Soul Singer in A Session Band proves. Comparing himself to the "Soul singer in a session band / Cut to ribbons beneath a microphone band" he bemoans that he "was a hopeless romantic / Now I'm just turning tricks". Ah, the curse of success.

Avid Conor-o-philes or gossip junkies will notice the inspiration of Classic Cars being a certain klepto hollywood actress who will remain nameless. But Winona Ryder aside, Classic Cars tackles the subjects of celebrity, image, and older women with a dextrous touch and suitably classic country stylings.

Middleman, the cowboy-styled epic that sounds in places suspiciously like the theme to Steven Spielberg's recent TV series Into the West, bemoans the impossibility of holding absolute principles in our shifting global landscape. The electronic vocal effects deliberately clash with the folksy melodies in an evocative fashion.

It's at this point in the album that one starts to doubt the wisdom of how the tracks were ordered and which should have been included in the album. Individually, Cleanse Song, No One Would Riot For Less, and Coat Check Dream Song are perfectly competent songs; but chaining three very low tempo, generally laid-back tracks together, and then ending on one (Lime Tree) only broken by glorious live favourite I Must Belong Somewhere is a bit much, especially as No One Would Riot gets dangerously close to the tedium barrier (it's grim, dark, eco-warrior message hampered by the fact that it's maybe just a bit; well, too dark and desolate.) Cleanse Song and Coat Check meander around happily, recalling a little bit of previous electronica experiment Digital Ash in A Digital Urn, but with less drive and urgency. Thankfully, I Must Belong Somewhere, with it's dozens of structured verses ranging from the whimsical "Leave the cauliflower in the casserole" to the charged "Leave the hawks of war in their capitals", almost saves the day. It's simple, strong melody and epic scope screams "Finale", but unfortunately Conor doesn't quit while he's ahead, ending on a fizzle with the sweet, but impossibly quiet Lime Tree, which simply doesn't have the confidence to end an album with a bang, or the melodic strength to be a quiet coda.

The biggest mystery about Cassadaga's line up though, remains the B-Sides; if you're going to write the best set of songs in your career, surely you put the highlights on the album? Not Conor. He saves some of the best tracks for the B-sides; the free download only Endless Entertainment contrasts lyrics like "My serotonin's rationed / I think I caught the blues ... My smile's in sad shape / All that dead weight I keep carrying" with jaunty, guitar led music to impressive effect. It's not a song to give away lightly.

Susan Miller Rag, the US-only-free-with-company-store-pre-orders-mini-cd is a real uncut gem. Raw guitars and drums mesh with a beautiful chorus "Far away from the rag trade / Far away from this maritime state you're stuck in / Relax your law / Relax your ego / And groove... from the deep-sea dive to the nose-bleed altitudes.". It sounds positively carribbean. Yes, I'm still talking about Conor Oberst.

More treats abound in the US EP single "Four Winds" (Import the disc from Amazon instead of buying all the British formats for the B-Sides) which really shines. Reinvent The Wheel's spiralling strings, undeniable melody and harmonica finale is a key track. It's followed by the delicately impressive M. Ward collaboration Smoke Without Fire, and the ragged joy of Stray Dog Freedom. After that, the righteous, riotous country rock of Cartoon Blues hits home; replete with a clever "cartoon" vocal trick on the lyrics; "Now my days are distractions that ring in my hands / Solitaire crosswords and films on demand / When you turn from a cartoon back into a man / You start to smell that human smell." As if to demonstrate how to end an album effectively with a quiet track, Tourist Trap then explores the familiar Bright Eyes territory of belonging and change complete with cowboy boot percussion. Beautiful.

I can't emphasise how strongly I feel that those extra tracks need to be hunted down before you can enjoy the complete Cassadaga experience. It's the album of his career, for sure, but Oberst seems damn well determined to make the worst of it. Perhaps he's just trying to avoid the session band's soul singer.

Cassadaga 78
Four Winds EP 94
Susan Miller Rag 86
Endless Entertainment 91