Customer Reviews

Starters Alternators

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

 

 

With Starters Alternators, Dutch punk band The Ex mark their 20th year, and what's impressive is that they keep getting better. The only remaining original member is singer G.W. Sok, but the lineup that's been its core for the last decade or so has developed an instantly recognizable sonic vocabulary: frantic, multilayered polyrhythms; guitars used for bursts of noise and texture as much as for recognizable notes; high-speed percussion centered on clicks, taps, and unbelievably heavy snare and kick; Sok's heavily accented two-note roar occasionally swapped out for drummer Katrin's Eastern European folk-influenced soprano.

Starters sounds a bit more raw than the Ex usually do, mostly because Steve Albini recorded it with his favorite trick: making drums sound like actual drums. On the opening "Frenzy," all we hear of Katrin for the first couple of minutes is a precise little tambourine part, as the guitarists play a clipped figure in a peculiar time signature over and over; then, finally, she switches to the drums and just about takes your head off. The Ex have always been tight and aggressive but here they're a garotte, so taut they cut through everything no matter how lightly they play. They've been immersing themselves in traditional and jazz forms -- as demonstrated on the superb Instant (1996), a double-CD of solo and small-group improvisations that drew on the Dutch jazz tradition of, what else, "instant composition."

It was a logical step for a band that's not just fascinated by high and international culture, music and literature, but actively engaged in it: Starters Alternators includes deliciously abrasive settings of poems by Elizabeth Bishop, Stephen Crane and Zimbabwe's Egely Donadi. The latter, an overtly socialist/feminist poem called "Mother" ("Your sweat waters the infertile soil...You are the worker of the year/You are the best worker in the world" -- it's better than it sounds), is sung by Katrin, whose finely modulated yodel cuts through her clattering percussive barrage.

As for the original lyrics, as usual, they're elliptical, politically engaged and sometimes very funny -- Sok has a better command of English wordplay than most native speakers. "Frenzy" is a history of international Marxism described by indirection and comedy: "That's when Lenin met McCarthy/And this, as far as I can see/Was the beginning of a beautiful frenzy." Only on the last track does the band show any signs of repeating itself, which for the Ex means covering a second song by the Hungarian folk group Muzsik·s, "Nem Ugy Van Most" (the first one was "Hidegen Fujnak A Szelek," a staple of their live show for years). They've grown into tremendous musicians without compromising their punk fury because they're more interested in the future of the world -- and all of its music -- than in their own past.

A beautiful frenzy?

This particular slight of tongue, the penultimate moment of the superb opening track, frenzy, pretty well sums up this phenomenal record. (Well, actually, it doesn't. That's why I'm penning this review, right?) In fact, I can almost see the sods who created Starters Alternators squatting in unison chanting said mantra while the unassuming music gods took note.

Jazz fan? The Ex's guitars mirror the best Coltrane sax adventure. Hell, these dutchmen (and women) have managed to get their guitars to sound like tubas with the ebola virus. Not relying on staid wall-of noise technique, the guitar assault probes and pokes at the right moments, rising to a thunderclap at others. At times its amazing such cacophony can be created by man and string alone. Rather, it mirrors the sound your blender makes when you throw in a pile of metal shards.

Yes, Steve Albini is a self-indulgentjerk. But I can't think of a producer that constantly pushes his clients to their creative and musical peak. The bass sound that arises on lets panic later sounds like these Dutch chaps and gals stringing the vocal chords of Barry White himself into the worlds largest and most hollow acoustic. The rhythm section does little more than any dimwit with arms and some physical stamina can do, but instead of lying behind the surface it reaches behind you when your attention wanes and grabs you two-fisted by the cerebellum and pulls you back into the track.

If Pavement has proved anything to the conventional rock world its that your lyrical approach has to be at least as varied as your song structures. Good bands, Ex, included, realize that listening to some half-witted dropout scream about the government is about as entertaining as Pat Buchanan screaming about the government. Vocalists G.W Sok and Katrin help themselves to heaping servings of irony, humor. Literary reference and high falutin critique. Frenzy is a dialectic where Sok jumps between Karl and Grocho Marx, not so much blurring the line but never recognizing it exists. It's a sin takes a Stephen Crane confessional and smothers it with jabbing, needle sharp guitars which sound like a cheap sax drowning. The Art of Losing plods forward with shimmering dissonance and Sok chanting Elizabeth Bishop's lines with a cynicism that isn't apparent in the text.

Why four stars? Five is reserved for a masterpiece, something that is not easily bestowed. For one it has to stand the test of time, and regardless of the generous mindproduct above, its unclear whether Starters Alternators has the staying power of say, Guided by Voices' Bee Thousand or Sonic Youth's most genuine daydreams. But hell, the first three spins alone is well worth the price of admission, whether or not it buys Steve Albini another muse to cry on.

The Ex have been playing their uncompromising brand of anarchist punk rock for over a decade now. In the past they have collaborated with kindred spirits like the Mekons, Dog Faced Hermans and Chumbawamba. The Ex have also recorded with Dutch avant garde jazz musicans and jazz cellist, Tom Cora. The one thing that has remained constant (aside from quality music and uncompromised creativity) is that Ex discs have been hard to find in the US. Starters Alternators will change that sorry situation. The band's debut release on Touch & Go should be relatively easy to find. The band's hyper-rhythmic sound is remains intact with Steve Albini's production complementing the songs. Most songs feature driving percussion, scrabbling guitars and off the wall vocals. Most of the songs are sung in English, but the closing track is an adaptation of a Dutch folk song. This is a wonderful record for adventurous listeners. Let the Ex jump start your weary ears.

I was expecting a middling record from a band long past its due date. Not so. This sounds like prime Fall, but even more rhythmically pummeling. Each song is distinct and and the sounds cover a wide landscape, from electronic squeaks to lock grooves to sturm and drang. Great stuff that's been on continuous rotation since I bought it.

Last year I was completely blown away by Fugazi's "The Argument." Fugazi is a band whose material has always been amazing, but whose most recent albums surpass (in my mind) just about anything else out there - including their own back catalog. The same is true with the Ex. This band resubmits the case for its own undeniable vitality year after year with increasingly powerful albums, stunning even the die-hard Ex disciples every single time. How can it be that the five-star classic, the landmark album, the masterpiece of Dutch punk, "Blueprints for a Blackout," is not even the Ex's best album? It boggles the mind. I hesitate to point to one single Ex album as `the best Ex album ever,' but "Starters Alternators" may well be just that.

After almost twenty years in punk, the Ex emerged with "Starters Alternators," which seems like an impossible album to beat. Here are some of the Ex's strongest lyrics, and quite simply their tightest and most accomplished musicianship. `Musicianship' can be something of a four-letter word in content-over-form circles of anarcho-punk, but goodness, goodness, it is no liability here. Steve Albini contributes some of his trademark production to ensure some truly inflammable material. This is the kind of blistering punk I can't get enough of. The Ex kick up a dissonant havoc of noise, seeming to beat their instruments to exhaustion, but at the same time they're a band who can change gears and turn on a dime without missing a beat.

There's no call for anyone to doubt the Ex. They are simply one of the best bands out there right now. Usually I like to name a couple of track highlights from an album, to give listeners something to listen to or download or whatever. But in this case pretty much every track's a highlight. This CD's cheap, so just buy it. I can't imagine you'll have any regrets.

of the four ex albums i own, this is far and away the most boring and expendable. i saw them on this tour and the songs from this album were great, so i suspect that they recorded the thing before the songs had fully gelled. fortunately at their show, they had all their out-of-print discs for sale so i got to pick up "scrabbling the locks," which is their best. "starters alternators" just might be their worst...