Rave redux
Zappa fans or Beeheart scholars may correct my impressions, but I always felt that as "Trout Mask" producer Frank Zappoa gave CB's career a publicity boost, but may have encouraged those familiar (from Mothers albums) yet seemingly pinched, or pedantic, dissonances - not in the music, but evident in his use of deliberately jarring edits, 'humorous' chatter, which serve as interruptions and are a minor flaw on Beefheart's epochal double album. I don't have much to add to the numerous intelligent reviews of this 1970 masterpiece. "Lick My Decals", issued a year later, is without such self-indulgence and remains a seamless, dazzling, tour de force, CB and his band of master mucians at their peak powers, and album full of fury, aggression, melancholy, humor. Despite its harsh and scathing moments, Beeheart embraces life, light, sex and play, and unlike his mentor digs into his own richly textured rock'n'roll - the band creates dense grooves embracing gospel, angular yet compelling instrumentals, Bo Diddley, Howlin Wolf, the Stones, New Orleans jazz, and late Coltrane with absolute committment, pushing and shaping the songs with his best singing and most focused and evocative lyrics at least until "Shiny Beast. " Never would CB & the MB sound so wild, yet focused, unencumbered by commercial considerations or outside producers. Zappa always seemed suspicious of pleasure, but Beefheart is a rocker and poet who basks in the physical world, as rooted in Whitman (moreso, really) as Breton. This is an essential album, and my complaint is that like much of CB's catalog it has not been upgraded or even in print, in years (the CD was issued in 1991). WHY? I know some long needed items in the CB catalog have been restored but the classic Warner Bros albums remain available if at all in early 'digital' compact discs. (Re)mastering has come a long way since 1990, and the Magic Band albums need to be upgraded for me and a whole new generation of music lovers. I mean WHAT IF MY 20 YEAR OLD COPY GETS SCRATCHED? Or stolen??? I shudder. . . . .
A Classic For Every Generation
As much as I love Trout Mask Replica, LMDO,B is, for me, tighter and more focused. Just the compositional scope and performance is enough to entice any serious student of late 60's-early 70's experimental music.
Van Vliet was not a composer in the classic sense; he was a poet who set his prose to the sounds in his head, whether it was the sound of his car's windshield wipers or the literal banging of piano keys.
The Magic Band of this period is great: Don on harp, soprano sax and vocals; Zoot Horn Rollo, all guitars; Rockette Morton, bass; Drumbo (John French-the man!), drums; and Ed Marimba (Dr. Art Tripp), drums and percussion.
The double drum attack on several of the tracks is unique in of itself and the way the bass really is not much holding down the bottom, but more so as a lead instrument are just 2 reasons that LMDO,B is such a pioneering
release.
My 16 year old son, an aspiring guitarist, can not get enough of this masterpiece, let alone the Captain; it's that good.
My Personal Favorite From The Beef
The only other music I had by Beefheart was his 45 of Diddy Wa Diddy with Who Do You Think You're Foolin' on the back side. I got this album before Trout Mask. I grew up in Palmdale in the late 60's, virtually a neighbor of the Magic Band, of sorts, and by the time I got this in 70, I had an idea of what to expect, and it certainly wasn't Diddy Wa Diddy! My neighbor across the street was a Beefheart freak and he played Safe As Milk on his car stereo all the time. I never knew any of the members, except I might have passed Bill Harkleroad (Zoot Horn Rollo) in the hallways of Palmdale High School here and there, but knew several aspiring musicians who ranted and raved about Don and how much they wanted to be part of the Magic Band. So, I didn't come to this album totally blind. Still, when I first heard Decals, I was shocked at the change. I was also into the Mothers and this was a nice addition to my Bizarre catalogue along with the original Alice Cooper band.
There is just nothing to compare this to. It is a more refined version of what went down on Trout Mask and that may be because Bill Harkleroad took over translating Don's frenetic piano ideas to a band format.
This is sure not toe-tapping elevator music, but a sonic exploration that fits no mold. It's an adventure from the opening strains of Decals to the final notes of Flash Gordon's Ape. Try to understand the lyrics? Never in a million years, but who cares? I sure don't. I think of the lyrics, as Frank Zappa once called singing, as "articulated vocal noises. " Beefhearts's voice, combined with the nonsensical lyrics, creates a bizarre sonic landscape that intertwines with the chaotic music accompaniment. Now that's about as artsy-fartsy as I can get describing music!
Years later I came to understand what Don meant when he said he didn't create music as much as sonic paintings. This is definitely a sonic painting in the abstract extreme! I have my favorites, with pieces of melody that still ring in my head such as Decals, Woe Is A Me Bop, and Dr. Dark. Yeah, good stuff! If you're looking for something a little different, I highly recommend this.
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Brazen avant rock blues, and some of his best
While his experimentation is often misunderstood as solely being weird or abrasive simply to be abrasive and weird, anyone who has spun through Ornette Coleman records of the 60s can hear how Beefheart might have been on a parallel journey of free-ing up pop/rock/blues harmonies. Although the Captain's "Trout Mask Replica" tends to dominate his reputation, seemingly for its sheer audacity to dispense with convention, his later records refine the balance of experimentation and rock/blues into something more pleasing (and arguably) enduring. One might argue that Ornette's 70's work, which incorporated more pop and funk influences, was giving a nod to the good Captain.
Records such as Doc At The Radar Station, Ice Cream For Crow, and Lick My Decals Off Baby ease back a bit on the abstract and free form aspects and push a little more towards the blues, rock, and the Captain's forceful vocals and persona. For many, Trout Mask Replica is more interesting to talk about than to listen to, these later records are fresh and fun. Some will still find him a bit chaotic, atonal, even weird, but they'll still hear rock, jazz and the blues from a fresh and novel angle. A testament to the greatness of these records is the variety of favorite tracks among those who hear them. The unpredictable swing and flow of "Smithsonian Institute Blues" still sounds fresh as it comes apart and recombines several times in two minutes. And even a fairly conservative listener will have to give kudos to the blues chops of "I Love You Big Dummy". Unlike much of Trout Mask Replica, these records really rock, and if one aspires to be erudite and analytical, there is still plenty to study.
The Beefheart legacy is far from being adsorbed into popular music, yet lots of interesting things have happened in the rock underground as a result of his influence. Unfortunately though, there has been an increased tolerance of bands just trying to be weird and chaotic, lacking the vocal chops, musicianship and creative ideas of the various Beefheart bands--It can hardly be avant-garde if one is ineptly aping what these records delivered in the 1970's and early 80s. The best tribute would be doing something truly fresh and original, as Beefheart delivered on this and his other top-shelf releases.
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One of Beefheart's Best
TMR is still my favorite, but LMDO,B is quickly catching up. I just discovered Beefheart this year and highly recommend this cd and his other masterpiece, Trout Mask Replica.
The songs on this cd seem to fall into two categories: half are "accessible" and half are "complicated" - meaning a little time and patience are required to allow the melodies to unfold on your ears and into your brain. The "accessible songs" ("I Love You, you Big Dummy", "Woe is uh Me Bop", title track) are simple on the surface, but on repeated listens are actually pretty complicated pieces themselves. "Woe Is uh Me Bop" is a great example. The song has almost mechanical-sounding guitar melodies that intersect in a clockwork fashion with the bass/drums. There is a marimba on this track, and it sounds at first like a simple added effect. However, the marimba melody is actually an important part of the song structure and adds to the song's composition considerably. It could just as easily been written as a guitar part, but then the sound and song would be completely different.
My favorites are "Bellerin Plain", the 3 instrumentals, "The Clouds Are Full of Wine" and "Flash Gordon's Ape". The instrumentals are absolutely amazing, by the way. I've never heard music like this before. It sounds alien, strange . . and beautiful. Once the melodies "click" in your brain, they are in there for good. "Flash Gordon's Ape" is to my ears the most complicated piece and in some ways a farther reach of the direction he was heading in with TMR. He really stretches the composition out here - I'm not a musician myself and don't have the words to describe exactly what's going on in the piece, in musical terms . . I just love the end result! Good stuff.
One of the reviewers here wrote that once you "get" these songs, it's like cupid hitting you right in your musical heart. I'd have to say that's an accurate assessment. Put the time in, let the music come to you, and you will be richly rewarded.
If you're tired of hearing the same ol' variations of the same ol' themes with every rock album to come out since the 50's . . try this on for size.
You can see a complete list of all Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band discography, or go back to the Captain Beefheart and the Magic Band tabs
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