Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
another excellent album from Clinic, April 14, 2008
I'm a relatively new fan of Clinic's music, but they're fast becoming one of my favorites. This most recent release is one of their best, with songs like "Emotions", "Coda", and the incredibly catchy "Tomorrow" being standouts. Ade Blackburn's vocals sound like no one else's out there. This UK band definitely deserves wider recognition.
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3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Clinic is sensitive to atmospheric conditions., July 2, 2008
I was of the party that lost track of Clinic after Internal Wrangler, I'm not sure why, I recall being frustrated with the train whistle motif that runs through all their songs and decided that they were out of ideas. They made a slight comeback with Visitations, and I was brought back into the fold by a chance nostalgic purchase of Do It, which I instantly dubbed their "best" in my mental review, especially since the last track makes thematic sense of that insistent train and the chugga-chugga of Clinic's music, giving me confidence they knew what they were doing all along.
Having the Clinic tick now firmly installed in my brain, like a pleasant form of OCD, I then went back and got Walking With Thee and Winchester Cathedral, and what was I/were we smoking? I'm not even sure how I was able to sustain life functions before without my daily fix of "Circle of Fifths" or "Thank You For Living." Getting into Clinic is the same as understanding the Bible, a shift of perception must first open the door for the leap of faith. You can't just expect out-of-the-gate melodies, or sit around licking your chops for another "Distortions." It's all about the instrumentation, the detail, the filigree, the clockwork construction of the songs within their obvious limitations. No one would compain that Van Gogh painted the same canvas again and again -- though he did -- because it's the little details that make each one stand out.
One of the impediments to appreciating Clinic is that, unlike almost anyone else in indie rock, they are actual musicians -- they harmonize together like a baroque chamber orchestra, and their songs are full of moments of deliciously tart atonality, or of surprising beauty, that fly by. Going back to the train metaphor, you could say that the rhythm of Clinic represents the repetitive motion of the wheels of the train, but it is the scenery outside that is ever-changing. This is why all their albums have a different character; Walking with Thee is vampiric late-night chillout music, Winchester Cathedral is their "Middle Eastern" album like the kind George Harrison would make if he had more consciousness of being a raving madman, Visitations has a CBGB's punk feeling, and Do It! is Blackburn's long-promised "rural" album. Yet each album contains seeds of all the others, so that Visitations also has rural moments that make you feel like someone is drawing a crop circle around you as you lay in the grass; Winchester Cathedral ( my favorite ) comes off as unhinged music-hall exotica despite some of the slowest songs Clinic have recorded, like "Home" and "Falstaff," and Do It! is just the opposite, somehow achieving its predominantly relaxed feeling with fast songs. There is just a more spacious, restrained feeling to them than before.
I don't know how they do it, because the albums really do all sound the same at first, there is no contrived attempt at a totally new sound from album to album. But the more you listen, the more each one flashes different pictures, varying moods and states of mind at you. Do It -- which should be listened to in the late afternoon, when the sun is still high in the sky but muted and calm -- has a nostalgic feeling to it. It brings me idyllic collages of days gone by that never existed. I begin to picture myself as a wealthy aristocrat in pre-Revolutionary France, rowing down the Seine with a parasol-twirling Leslie Caron. Everything is perfect. But then my attention is drawn to a water-spider on the surface of the river -- I look up at Leslie who is smiling -- she smooths out her beautiful floral dress, brushing some crumbs off her lap... If you are a fan of Stereolab's Emperor Tomato Ketchup and its sun-drenched yet ominous mood, you'll know what I mean.
There is some confusion about lyrics, about what Ade Blackburn is going on about. Well, that is no longer a secret to me, but since he seems to want to be enigmatic, I'll leave him to his funny game. If you can't figure out who "Evil Bill" or "The Magician" or "The Equalizer" is, among many other aliases that he has in these songs ( but mostly "you" or "thee" ) I'm not going to enlighten you. It's just that people refuse to see the horrible reality that's staring them in the face, so they live in a kind of dream where nothing means anything. Blackburn is taking advantage of that dream. My only question is -- which side is this guy on?
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5.0 out of 5 stars
a truly magnificent cd, August 28, 2008
there is not a bad song on this beauty. it will definitely end up as one of my top 5 for 2008.they've been good since they started and all their cd's are worth owning.
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~ Portishead
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