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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Wresting songs out of speech,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Songs of You & Me (Audio CD)
This album smacks of breakups and divorce. Don't know if it's autobiographical actually, but it sure rings true to me, as it would any listener who's been left in the lurch. Difference between me and New Zealander Knox is that he has a home recorder (don't know again about his home studio, as this is rather primitively recorded, although with greater clarity and sonic fidelity than his other solo efforts, belying his "pioneer of lo-fi DIY" status in the alt-rock pantheon). It's divided into two sections, and the first eleven songs end with a lacerating "Young Caucasian Female" that's one of the most naked admissions of loneliness and abandonment I've yet to hear. So painful that I would not want to play it again--and this is meant as high praise. The song reminds me of David Thewlis' performance in Mike Leigh's film "Naked" in its rawness.The remaining ten tracks seem to nudge after the breakup into a more whimsical approach; this does fit the adjusted emotion as the album continues, but the inclusion of three straight songs (#14-16) that sound too overtly slight (always a problem on any Knox-related recording, sorry to say) do bring this album down a half-star from what would have been a rare five-star rating to 4 1/2 stars, which I would give if Amazon had allowed me to calibrate. Not many albums reach such heights, even among the greats that Knox has been inspired by, if truth be told. Echoes haunt these grooves of many illustrious influences; not only Lennon's psychic torture but Dylan's versifying and phrasing, Eno's "Needles in the Camel's Eye"--borrowed magnificently on the closing song, Leonard Cohen (name dropped appropriately in a lyric that speaks of Knox trying like the poet to turn speech into song), and the new-wave stripped down efforts of early XTC or the direct style of Pete Shelley of the Buzzcocks (the latter two felt also in Knox's early band Toy Love as well as his work with ex-Toy Lover Alec Bathgate as the duo Tall Dwarfs). I recommend this album as one of the best NZ efforts of its alt-rock peak over the 80s and 90s; it's well worth seeking out for whatever price it may fetch. It's too honest, perhaps, for repeated listenings, but it does justice to not only the endlessly plumbed topic of loss and betrayal, but to music that can somehow make this topic fresh, poignant, and cathartically experienced on behalf of the listener looking for insight as well as melodies, unpretentious yet intelligent and heartfelt.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
QUALITY HYPERACTIVE POP,
By
This review is from: Songs of You & Me (Audio CD)
Chris Knox, often accompanied only by his electric guitar, sings wound-up, hyper pop songs. He also uses the ol' pre-programmed Casio keyboard on a few songs, and it actually works. The sound quality isn't the greatest, but Knox's pop sense and energy more than make up for it. The best of the fast songs(such as "Half Man/Half Mole") are insanely catchy, but Knox is equally adept at brooding, slower songs like "Nothing Comes Clear" and the almost doo-wopish "One Fell Sweep". You probably won't have an easy time finding this one, but it's definitely worth buying if you happen to come across it. A rare instance where being a total spaz works in someone's favor. Four stars.
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