Customer Reviews

Dispepsi

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Rather than actually review DisPepsi, I'm going to make these observations:

1.) This CD qualifies as art. It says more than the mere sum of its words and music. 2.) Yes this a sound collage work. But unlike most (even great) sound collage albums, this one is totally musically satisfying and stands up to repeat listenings. I'm willing to wager that by the third listening, you'll find yourself singing along to "Aluminum or Glass: the Memo." 3.) The CD is often very funny, and quite profound. But there is so much more to this CD than humor or the overt message, that long after the joke is too familiar, it will still be listenable. 4.) This is often a surprisingly emotional CD. 5.) If this were the ONLY great CD in Negativeland's catalog, it would be strong enough to earn them a place as one of the greatest US underground bands of the 20th century. 6.) What you really need to know, is that you really need to hear this CD, and that it will be worth keeping after that first listening.

Is this the ultimate in culture jamming? Poignant, intelligent, funny, bitingly satirical, and foot-tappingly catchy, DisPepsi assaults the listener with snippets of advertisements, advertising training materials, and other materials to show us what ad execs _really_ think about us (I'll give you a hint: we, the consumers, are an army of brainless sponges).

Simply brilliant.

I feel like I've just been shot point-blank in the stamper. I think I need a Pepsi.

Negativland's indictment of consumerism, celebrity, advertisements and soft drinks finds them in top form most of the way through. The samples are excellently chosen and timed, especially on "Why is this Commercial?", with it's "Hi, I'm me, I'm using this to sell you this" line, and on "A Most Successful Formula". Some of the sample-laden tracks go forth in a musically, with fast paced sampling techniques and synth backing, but others form a more coherent collage, like "All She Called About", which is an interesting work about the 'New Coke' advertising campaign. Another of the sample-heavy songs is "I Believe it's L", which is about soft drink taste tests, and flies right through it's six and a half minute running time with innovative and interesting samples, musical accompaniment, and varied content. Other tracks are simple works of satire, like "Humanitarian Effort". Less sample-reliant tracks are also present, which differ in feel and quality. "Aluminum or Glass: The Memo" plods along with a simple bass and drum arrangement, recetations from an advertising handbook, samples, noises, and interesting lyrics about men, seagulls, ants, Pepsi, and many other disparate subjects. Most of the other "song-based-songs" are of lesser quality than "Aluminum or Glass", but "Drink it Up" and "The Greatest Taste Around" are satirical and clever enough to still rank among the top five songs of the album. However, the lengthy "Happy Hero" drags along over five minutes, and really says nothing new beyond the first minute. In fact, "Happy Hero" is the only mediocre track out of thirteen, which makes this an artistic success for a group working in such a variable and difficult medium. Enjoy DisPepsi.

How can music be adverbially adjectival, lovingly folksy, seemingly chaotic, irreverantly anti-commercial, hilarious, catchy, thought-provoking, danceable, and really weird all at the same time? The answer is simple: Negativland produced it. Unlike almost everything else, Negativland continue to draw from the total possible soundscape, concentrating here, if it's possible, on samples from old commercial promotional items and simple, inspiring anthemic melodies. You will be humming the greatest ordinary melodies with decidedly provocative lyrics... and loving it. More sonically varied than the masterful "Escape From Noise", but recognizably less melodic, "DISPEPSI" is "a most successful formula."

So if you've never heard of them, Negativland are sound collage artists, for the most part at least. They take sounds from commercials, movies, music, or anything they can get their hands on and manipulate them and blend them to make something new. There are lots of sound collage artists out there, but what seperates Negativland from the pack is that they've always been able to find the most unbelievable sounds and quotes, while their music sounds no more melodic than a train wreck, but still remains bitingly satirical.

They've been at it for a few decades now, and some of their favorite targets include pop music, religion, and nuclear power. But this time they've chosen one target: Pepsi. An obvious choice? Probably. Can they squeeze and entire album out of Pepsi commercial samples? Yes. As I said, they have archives of sounds, and there's probably no one else out there with the resources to make this album. A lot of people argue that Dispepsi's concept is too limiting, but I disagree. The album's songs don't really repeat themselves surprisingly, and there seems to be a flow and a real storyline to the album. The album is dense and and full of jingles and celebrity endorsements, reflecting our world where its impossible to escape advertising.

The best song on the album is the power pop song "Aluminum or Glass." Its very catchy and the lyrics are some of the best Negativland has ever written: "Would a man living in Los Angeles understand what a seagull is? / Would he know about the ants there in the grass?" Between all the verses, that weird-voiced Weatherman recites lines from guide to making commercials. "These Pepsi ads should not look too urban, too ethnic, too new wave or too anything!" The final song is an amazing attack on commodities. Here in America "we want soaps and cigarettes, cereals and soft drinks, cake mixes and candy, frozen pies and shaving cream, laxatives and beers, Kool-aid and clear toothpastes and margarines and fruit juices, Hallmark cards, the lotions, the pet foods, the shampoos and hair dyes, puddings, and headache remedies in their tins." The key word is that we "want" them, but we don't need them. We do not want to be ugly. We want money.

Who are we? I mean, really? A hundred years ago, something like this would be unimaginable. Music was about people, and it was about feelings. The fact that an album about a soda company can be made today is as good a reflection of our times as all those silk-screened pictures of Marilyn Monroe. The idea is the epitome of pop art. The only problem is that almost everything on this album has been said before.

in a world of sellouts and artistic cowards, the insidious drone of negativland's complex aural collages is like the pause that refreshes. their wit is sharp and their critiques are insicive. the rub here is exactly how to categorize this as music--but that's part of the point. if you're looking to be sedated by easy melodies, fatuous lyrics and sentimental fodder--then this is not the disc for you. if however, you seek to explore the frontiers of sonic and sociological artistry, then dispepsi will become a cherished antidote to too much sugar, carmel color and carbonation.

An album about Pepsi vs Coke and marketing in general! Another total score from the masters of media-terrorism (whatever that means). "DisPepsi" (get it? Dis Pepsi? Ha ha ha What a title!) is a great return to form from the wretchedness that was "Free". Quite possibly the best thing they've ever done (besides the immortal U2 single, of course, and I haven't heard the Dick Vaughn tape). There's some sing-along Pepsi jingles, some celeb endorsement samples, some REAL truth in advertising, an entire song dealing with "New Coke" (What a stupid thing it was, now that ten-something years have passed), a magnificent 5-minute telephone speech that sums up how to keep Coke and Pepsi from ruling the world, and dig the Ricardo Montalban sample! Absolutely no filler on here. Oh and check out the liner notes: "All of the cola commercials that were appropriated, transformed and re-used in this recording attempted to assault us in our homes without our permission." True, very true. This is by far the stupidest record review I've ever written, but I'll go on. And you also get a pamphlet proposal to Coke and PepsiCo about advertising. You always get cool stuff with Negativland CDs. Oh and I heard that Pepsico has NO intention of suing Negativland in any way! Great album! Total score!

Fans of Negativland should find this disc their most enjoyable as well as their easiest to listen to. I personally think "Happy Heroes" should have received airplay as it is one of the most mainstream type of things these guys have ever done. "A Most Successful Formula" is, again in my humble estimation, one of their most "musical" collages. The entire disc is very funny, listenable, and takes direct aim at the uninvited corporate salesmen that invade our lives every day in so many forms.

One of Negativalnd's Finest works! If you ever had the feeling of simultaniously laughing your head off, smirking at something that sounds so totally outrageous, then feeling like a horse kicked you in the face cause you realize that all your life YOU HAVE BEEN "HAD," you will see what I mean!

Shortly after Negativland's "Letter 2 and Numeral U" lawyerfest, they created this album. One thing you can say about Negativland is that they refuse to admit defeat. After each of their little media pranks, and after the lawsuits, they come back slugging! Not only did they re-release their hillarious "U2" songs in a different package (TGAFEAWGAS), but they set their sights on one of the biggest targets out there, the soft-drink empire of Pepsi Cola!

Using samples from the hundreds of Pepsi ads that we all have been bombarded with over the years, they have rearranged their samples into a savage "bite" that carves "a new one" on the corporate sugar-water empires.

At the end of their song: "Drink it up" there is a kid imitating the sound of a dollar bill accepter of a soft drink machine! When you hear that, you first laugh because it sounds so corny. Then you smirk, remember hearing that ad on the radio and TV. Then you groan, realizing that corny ad with it's sounds suckered you into buying more Pepsi!

In the song" Aluminum or Glass: The Memo" they sing about the average man in Los Angeles and wonder if he can comprehend where the homeless live or comprehend the bubbles in his glass of Pepsi. Quite a musical piece! And after every thought provoking stanza, the Weatherman reads text from an advertising memo regarding production tactics and goals for the next Pepsi ad!

Finally, in "Bite Back," they challenge us in our consumer habits. Do we really need 2 newspapers a day, all the cigarettes, all the soft drinks and all the stuff being constantly hawked to us by the corporate gurus? "Bite Back" is their answer. And at the very end of all this barrage of "reformed" Pepsi ads, we hear the sound of an aluminum can being crushed and thrown on the ground.

From the saying "Hi, I'm me, I'm using this to sell you this" to the countless spokesmen for products being hillariously sampled to Bill Cosby saying:"Isn't this the best taste ever in the history of EVER?," this gem of an album will forever turn you off from drinking another can of Pepsi "in the history of ever!"

Back in 1985 Michael Jackson was a genuine superhero: all over the TV when MTV still played music videos for a world much smaller and more centralized than ours. There was no controversy about child abuse, no visible plastic surgery. He was still riding on Thriller and was, quite literally, the world's sweetheart in a way that it would be impossible for anyone to be in 2010.

So, Jacko does a Pepsi add, and his hair catches fire, which was, if you can believe it, his most sensationalized press to date. But people actually gathered around there little 1985 TVs to watch Jackson's add, which cost him a few hair folicles but made him and Pepsi millions

Actually, celebrity endorsements go back to the 1950s, and if you think infomercials are a modern night time nightmare invented for has been and never ran hosts, go watch some old Author Godfey.

Dispepsi deconstructs this whole weird merge of art, commerce and entertainment in a battle of the soundbites. This is all set to pretty interesting music, sort of an ambient advertising modern classical copy.

I am not sure if Dispepsi is simply laying out the absurdity of a major name lending his or her self to useless products, but of course it happens all the time, and idiotic as it is it does bring weird questions to bare? Is Boca Java a coffee for conservatives because Rush Limbaugh advertises it? Does Starbucks make commie leftest Late Rush never touches? Donald Sutherland does voice overs for Volvo. Need the money? Or does liberal Hollywood want us driving in Eurodrag.

More important: why is any artist or serious thinker trying to sell us stuff to begin with. Does it undermine the art, the political message? I think so. Don't eat those Delhi Lama Cracker Jacks. There is no revelation at the bottom. Obama salami contains no change or audacity of hope.

Dispepsi does not really pose these questions but it really does not have to. They are in the subtext, and while you are thinking of what NegativLand is implying here, it is great to go for the ride this sound collage takes you on.