Customer Reviews

Operating Theatre

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

 

 

(Okay, that was far too alliterative for comfort....)

Happily, the answer is yes. Like its predecessor TELLS THE STORY, THE OPERATING THEATER is a mix of folk music, deadpan sick jokes, nostalgia, and celebrations of both the strange and the quotidian.

Tracks like the sly "Where You Belong" and "Cadavers" (unburied bodies are "kicked aside and picked on by ordinary folks/Employed by student doctors in ungodly practical jokes") reinforce Brian's "Burl Ives meets Edward Gorey" image. The ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY reviewer who dubbed him a "gansta folkie" will be glad to hear "Loathsome Idols," in which Brian rocks out on his electric zither while describing some seriously antisocial behavior (and though he wrote the song years ago, thanks to recent events in Afghanistan it's topical).

Lest I give Brian the wow-ain't-he-clever kiss of death, I hasten to add that many of the tunes are a hell of a lot of fun. "Rumpelstiltskin" often cracks up live audiences, while "Flexible Flyer" will become a winter holiday classic if there's any justice.

Finally, I have to mention my favorite tracks, which happen to be the two quietest songs on the album. The dreamy "Sick Day" makes the idea of staying home "with my hot water bottle and the flu" alluring, and "Solomon Grundy," performed completely straight, is simply gorgeous.

This is a timelessly great album that anyone would have to try very, very hard not to like. Mixing baroque, rock and folk sensibilities, this is simple, intelligent and humorous music played with great skill on rarely-heard instruments. I've never thought I'd spit out a cliche like this, but Brian Dewan's Operating Theatre is truly an album for all ages and most musical tastes.

If 'The Princess Bride' were an album instead of a movie, this would be it. Not that they have anything to do with each other, but the attitudes are similar.

Listen to the samples that Amazon makes available. The best songs (in my opinion) are unfortuantely not available as samples, but listen to 'Kids' and 'Where They Belong.' This album is satisfying in every way and has already made its way into heavy rotation for both myself and my infant daughter.

I purchased this album in 1999 well before its commercial release from Brian himself. I found it then, as I do now, the most beautiful album that i have ever heard. That may sound like an over-statement, however, i truly mean it. There's nothing else to say about it.

Brian's first record revealed an artist writing things that were very personal and yet seemed to transcend the times. From what we had seen of him over the years (we belong to the three-degrees of separation club), it seemed a very accurate picture of who he was. But what happens to the artist when the man resigns himself to the times? When the man whose interest has always been outside mere novelty and the mad search for eternal youth chooses to pursue a trendy sweet young thing in his personal life? We were worried.

Thankfully, it means nothing detrimental to the enjoyment of music lovers. This record is as rigorous in its implicit critique of hipster secularism ("Loathsome Idols"), as unsparing in its simultaneous explosion of the cult of romance and wonder at the beautiful functionality of the human body ("The Human Heart" and "Sick Day") as one could hope. The music rich and rewards frequent playing. His playing has become more elegant (witness the harplike effects on "Sick Day") and idiosynchratic with age. And the recording of his voice is warm and close without being intrusive.

We are very used to biography as art today. Perhaps we should let this be a lesson against holding a man's personal life as a barometer for the quality of his art.