Customer Reviews

Arrow (Dig)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I appreciate groups who grow and evolve, that's why I think this album is a masterpiece. They took chances and they were right. The songs are catchy, easy to absorb, but there is a musical maturity that I never see. The arrangements, the playing, the writing, textures. You have to get this album, it's important, and you'll love it, like I do.

This is incredible work! I love these songs, especially "our Team Is Grand" epic and revolutionary. This band is also amazng live, I finally got to see them, they are a REAL band!

There's a wonderful variety of lyrical and musical material here, mixing soft rock, pop, blues, cowboy songs, Beatles, Beachboys, even a moment of Ravel!. Clare Manchon writes subtle, witty, and often poignant songs featuring sweet melodies and interesting harmonic structures. Olivier Manchon's colorful arrangements include brass and winds along with his usual gorgeous string writing and playing. ( I can't believe they left the spotty string intonation on the cover version of Phil Collins' "That's All", though.) There's percussion, via Rich Stein, but no full-on drumset used anywhere, giving the ears a welcome break. Bassist/guitarist, Bob Hart is everywhere tastefully supportive, an ensemble of kazoos sound like bees in a song about bees, and Olivier makes extensive use of imitative counterpoint throughout--an art rarely found in popular music.

This is soothing but intelligent music, based on the pop music aesthetics of mainly the 1960s and 70s, with some old-time Americana circa 1920s and 30s. So soothing, I admit to recommending it to a friend whose cat died recently. But it's not the dull blythe "beautiful people" music that John Dworkin says it is in his hilariously ironic and scathing review of this CD on [...]:

"The Reasons' lyrics and sound (Clare's voice being occasionally charming but mainly cloyingly irritating) are eyeball deep in clever and cutesy... Will someone give the beautiful people a tour of Afghanistan please?"

While there's truth to Dworkin's observations on the surface, unless I've completely misunderstood Clare and the Reasons' raison d'etre, Arrow is an Existential and understanding trope on the frivolous lifestyle common to the cool and beautiful people, not an endorsement of it. There is also ample reference to fear, pain, and quiet desperation in Clare's lyrics to dispel the 'beautiful people' myth. "It's a joke, so let's laugh and look up at stars", sings Clare in the opening track, "All the Wine", apropos of nothing--or everything, as the case may be. As Edgar Allan Poe wrote in The Masque of the Red Death, "Even for the utterly lost, to whom life and death are equally jest, there are some things about which no jest can be made." Arrow is something like that...and Clare's voice is lovely.

I must admit that up until not too long ago, I had no idea who Clare and the Reasons were. I had purchased tickets to a Van Dyke Parks concert at which he was splitting the bill with an unfamiliar mystery group, but Parks' endorsement of their qualities assured me of their promise. We were pleasantly surprised when they began to play, switching instruments and playing various instruments at once, not as a gimmick but to serve the songs ... and what songs they were! Clare and the Reasons won over a crowd that was largely oblivious to their existence prior to the show with their sweet and deceptively simple songs, and we rushed to buy their albums to preserve just a small piece of the beautiful experience of their live show.

"Arrow" is the album that most reminds me of the qualities of their performance, and features most of the songs they performed. The music can feel like an indulgence due to the sweetness of Clare's voice, but there is real complexity and depth of emotion here beyond the smooth surface. The songs are exceptionally melodic with strong hooks, and while instrumentation and ideas vary from song to song, there is a consistency of mood that affects the listener in a wonderful way. The music is achingly beautiful, but as another reviewer has pointed out, it is neither self-serving nor naive as such. It's just that Clare seems to find beauty, humour and heartache in unexpected places, and is able to relay the experience of these things with true, delicate and relatable empathy.

The bottom line is that this is exceptionally well-played music made simple. These people know what they are doing, but their intelligence never leads to excesses, and always serves the songs. "Arrow" manages to be both accessible and complex. It is a richly rewarding listening experience, and I would heartily recommend it to popsters, teeny boppers, hard-eared sociopaths and sweet geriatrics alike.