1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Largely extraneous., August 23, 2005
This review is from: Godman (Audio CD)
The "Godman" single, second off of "Dead Bees on a Cake", features three mixes of the title track and two of the previously unreleased "Shadowland" along with a "short film" by David Sylvian and Ingrid Chavez.
Confession first-- I've never watched the film, and I probably never will, so I can't comment on it. I'll stick to the music.
"Godman" is one of the strongest cuts on "Dead Bees ona Cake". Featuring a fractured drum loop from David Sylvian (based on a drum track by Scooter Warner) and phenomenal guitar playing from Marc Ribot (on acoustic) and Sylvian (on electric), it is a driving, bizarre, and intriguing piece, well worth attention. The remixes are, well, they're remixes. I've always had a hard time with remixes as a rule-- the "Wagon Christ Remix" removes the old drum track with a techno beat, the "Guy Sigsworth Remix" strips the entire backing track altogether and replaces it with an almost minimalist one (as well as speeds up the vocal) before adding an oddball beat. Both are interesting but neither are as good as the original.
"Shadowland" is a bit more interesting-- this was recorded in 1995 according to the liner notes, and some time later both the lyrics and the melody ended up on Russell Mills' "Undark" album as "How Safe is Deep?". While I prefer the Undark variant, hearing the demo is quite intriguing. The "northfield" mix is the backing track with a spoken word vocal by Sylvian's then-wife Ingrid Chavez on top of it and in many ways works better. The background is a dark, shifting, ambient haze and works well in both cases.
Still, there's not enough good on here to make this worth digging up for all but completionists-- the demo is interesting but the remixes are unessential.
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