Customer Reviews

Worn Copy

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Somewhere deep the in Hollywood hills, recording on some broken tape recorder, is this monstrosity, Ariel Pink. Was there a weirder release this year? Sounding like an FM radio from an alien planet that's currently undergoing their "70s moment" he flies in your face with the strangest songs I have ever heard of. Where did he get these melodies and these lyrics? Many have criticised him of ripping off shampoo commercials or radio ads for new cars, this is true. His work sounds like remnants of a PR company specializing in the chessiest music for the cheesiest third world country. But this is exactly where his genius lies, he has an ear for these melodies that seem to stick onto your subconcious and stay there forever. His lyrics are horrifyingly opposite of whatever his actual music sounds like. Lyrics dealing with satanism, the end of the world, being broke. This music is unlike any indie rock, any noise, any freak folk. This is the sound of popular culture stabbing itself in the brain. Epics run into diddies that run into symphonic broken walls running into kiddie pools. The music is recorded on Ariel's analogue 8 track which produces the blurriest and crappiest sound imaginable, but it works for what he is creating. It's like watching 70s television on a giant old 70s TV set, blurred color & creaking dials. I had a chance to see Ariel in concert, and he's just as strange as his music sounds, traipsing around stage dressed in what looked like a rainbow brite reject costume singing through a broken fuzzy mike with a strange backup band all replicating exactly what you hear on his records, which is just crazy and weird and catchy. Ariel is great, he's a true outsider and largely misunderstood by the music press. This album is one of the great releases of 2005 and MUST have for anyone interested in music that you just can't find or hear anywhere else.

Some have said this Mr. Ariel Pink character is some sort of "outsider" artist a la Daniel Johnston, although the fact that he lives in Los Angeles and seems quite capable of writing, performing, producing, recording and even releasing his own material would belie that assertion. Imagine, if you will, an FM radio station that plays pop/rock hits from the '60s, '70s and '80s starts transmitting its broadcasts into deep space, and is received by some very strange aliens who know nothing of Earth culture. They assume these sounds are a form of direct communication with them, and they reply by naively trying to replicate the sounds they hear. "Worn Copy" is the result. Many of these songs could be long-lost psychedelic nuggets, or melodic 70's pop, or New Wave obscurities, played on a standard, if lo-fi, guitar/bass/drums/synth lineup. However, they're smothered in tape hiss and echo and all manner of bizarre sound effects--some songs seem to be interrupted by advertising jingles! The vocals are often hard to decipher, but considering the song "Oblivious Peninsula" seems to mainly consist of repeating that nonsense phrase, one gets the feeling it doesn't really matter, and what to make of a title like "Immune to Emotion"? It also doesn't matter if this is the product of a genuine outsider or just some dadaist art prank, 'cause in the end it comes off as a sincere, but gloriously failed, attempt by some odd individual, gripped both by nostalgia and obsession, to recreate a time when "lying in bed, with the covers pulled up over your head/radio played so no one could hear it" (as the Ramones once put it) was just the oultimate in bliss. In short: one the strangest, but most interesting, pop albums you're ever likely to hear.

low tech and brilliant, music that seems to have channeled Zappa, Winchester Cathedral, and god knows what else. incredibly funny, and then suddenly sad. mr pink is a genius, you betcha. and he explains what it is and how it is to live here in this strange quasi-city in the shadow of the industry, in the curiously full and fun wasteland of other people's dreams.

This is a beautiful CD> It has amazing creative songs. You can't beat the bass lines, the vibes, the dynamics of the songs. I wish I could thank him for this awesome CD myself.

This album is such an amazing lo-fi masterpiece, if you can't find a way to appreciate it, you should move to Baghdad.