Listening Post: Devo - Shout

Devo- Shout - 1984

I'm not sure what to make of this. Everything I've read says it's awful. And it's the last Devo recording for a while. Also follows a tradition of self-production after someone else at the helm. But I kinda like the opening track, the title track. It reminds me of Human Sexual Response's "Pound" or "Land of the Glass Pinecones". But poppy. It's obvious that Devo is goin for radio play or some kind here. They've tasted the money teat and, why the hell not? Aren't they the godfathers of this movement? Shouldn't they benefit from what they've wrought?
This is the most generic synth music one can imagine. It's Flock of Seagulls/Thomas Dolby/Howard what's his name and everyone else, though devoid of personality and without glee. Although "The 4th Dimension" sure tries hard to have a melody...
I don't find Shout as offensive as it appears many others do. Of course, that could be because my expectations are so low. It's a notch below the last one.


Grade: C-
ASide: Shout
BlindSide: The 4th Dimension

Listening Post: Devo - Oh, No! It's Devo

Devo - Oh, No! It's Devo - 1982

The opening track of Oh, No!, "Time Out for Fun" is at once the full immersion into synth rock (there's not a real instrument on this record, save Mothersbaugh's vocals and even that sounds fake) and also more fun than anything else on the previous record.
With Oh, No! it seems obvious the guys had given up on their "De-evolution" doctrine and were going for hitsville, U.S.A.
At just over 30 minutes, it's barely an album. Using lyrics based on the writings of John Hinckley ("I Desire")
make it a subversive and caustic one as well.
On Oh, No! It's Devo, the group employed ex-Queen, ex-Cars producer Roy Thomas Baker who shines everything up nice and glossy. But that doesn't mean there isn't bite. Well, if not "bite" at least it's easier on the ears.
An antiseptic record, it's no Freedom of Choice, but it's not as dull as New Traditionalists.
I'm one of those people who actually like the uber-pop sheen of Weezer's Make Believe. It's no surprise that I like this one as well.

Grade: B-
ASide: Peek-A-Boo
BlindSide: Time Out for Fun, That's Good, Big Mess, Deep Sleep

Listening Post: Devo - New Traditionalists

Devo - New Traditionalists - 1981

Ah, success.
Following the success of their massive top 40 hit, "Whip It" and with a healthy disdain for their new-to-the-cause fans, Devo came out the next year with their most synthetic sounding album to date. I've already discussed in the last post the reasoning for marginalizing the guitars and it's really evident here. More than noticeable. This is the sound that would mire down bands like Sparks and The Cars. The affection for the disaffected sound of synths.
That said, much of this album is poppier than one would have expected, but that's most likely due to the instrumentation. The collection of songs from "Through Being Cool" to "Pity You" and others show a strong disdain for their status as pop icons. I mean, Devo were supposed to be artists, right? They were Warholian to the t, no?
The hit "Beautiful World" suffers from sounding just like Sparks "Cool Places", obviously the latter is inspired by the Devo tune which came out 2 years earlier. The Sparks song is better but the Devo song has Marco Pirroni-esque guitars.

This album is the first time Devo produced themselves and it shows, there's no one to stop them from the keys-implosion.
The result is a rather tedious affair. A smattering of hooks here and an occasional catchy track there, but otherwise, this is a lackluster affair.


Grade: C-
ASide: Through Being Cool, Jerkin Back n Forth, Beautiful World
BlindSide:
DownSide: Soft Things, The Super Thing

Listening Post: Devo - Freedom of Choice

"Freedom of Choice is what you got. Freedom from choice is what you want."



Devo - Freedom of Choice - 1980


There is a terrific interview with Bob Lewis, the unsung co-creator of Devo here. It's a must read if you are even remotely interested in the history of pop music and new wave of the 70s. My favorite takeaways?
That Girl U Want is the band's rewrite of "My Sharona" in an effort to get a hit. And that the reason they moved away from guitars was because the guitarist, Bob Mothersbaugh, married a girl that co-creator Gerry Casale liked and so Casale started edging the music away from guitars and more to synths. Hysterical. And a good cautionary tale. For that is one of the things that contributed to the creative demise of the band.
But, that's not going to happen here because this is Freedom of Choice, the big hit, the monster, the one you probably had if you had one at all. The one with "Whip It".
I bought this the week it came out and didn't listen to Side Two for the first couple of weeks. I never got around to it, since Side One was so fantastic.
By the second song on FoC it's obvious that what is happening is the fulfillment of the promise of the debut. The robo-soul is there but the dystopian snark has been replaced by hooks and catchy tunes. The hit single, "Whip It", is the very definition of catchy and hooky. It's transporting as its so obviously from an era, and yet, it's timeless at the same time. Delicious.
My favorite track was the almost anti-Numan synth track, "Snowball". The energy coupled with monotony almost dares you to pogo and air synth at the same time. The cheeky, "Ton O' Luv" is as funny as it is slovenly. The title track is replete with irony and black humor. If you don't listen, you won't get it.
And that's just side one.
Side Two opens with a song as easily played by the likes of Dead Kennedys, "Gates of Steel", and proves that turning "punk" into "new wave" does indeed make it more palatable and easy on the ears of mom and dad. Subversive, though it is. The album is relentless in it's timelessness and nostalgia. There are 100 minimalist synth bands in "Cold War" but none of them had the humor. Perhaps it was because Devo was born out of the tragedy of Kent State by ex-hippies who saw the world for what it truly was for a few minutes: inhumane and hysterically funny.
The album runs out of steam a bit toward the end, "Planet Earth" sounds like something that B-52s would have done, but this is nitpicking.
Freedom of Choice is a seminal album.

Grade: A+
ASide: Girl U Want (It IS My Sharona!), Whip It, Freedom of Choice
BlindSide: it's Not Right, Snowball, Ton O' Luv

Listening Post: Devo - Duty Now For The Future

Devo - Duty Now For the Future - 1979

Duty Now For the Future opens with Devo's Corporate Anthem which could just as easily been the theme to Space:1999 or The Lathe of Heaven, it's sci-fi to the core, dystopian but with a sense of the absurd. Things weren't that bleak back then. They were, but we all had a sense of humor back in the 70s.

The album tries to be as cheeky as its predecessor but doesn't quite hit as hard in most places. The obvious Uncontrollable Urge, "Clockout" tries to hard to be new wave soul that it just misses the mark as does "Blockhead", this album's "Mongoloid". That said, almost all the songs on Duty Now clock in and out so quickly that they play as a sort of soundtrack for corporate cubist America. Taken as a concept album of sorts, Duty Know is actually quite brilliant.
Taken song for song, Duty Now is actually not that great and a completely unnecessary relic in light of how brilliant the debut and the next record would be.


Grade: B-
ASide: Secret Agent Man
BlindSide: Timing X
DownSide: Swelling Itching Brain

Listening Post: Devo - Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!

Devo - Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! - 1978

Devo's debut explodes with the herkiest of jerkiest pop songs, "Uncontrollable Urge". Mark Mothersbaugh's nerd voice is married perfectly to the style AND the substance. He's an outlier. Devo is all outliers. "Praying Hands" is their version of soul. The yips and yelps only contribute to the disconnectedness. Their deconstructed "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction", though more easy on the ears than The Residents version a few years earlier, is actually just 13 years away from the original. Think about that. How much had music changed between 1965 and 1978. This was bold experimentation, it was punk at its core, but relabeled to not scare off parents. Even the most punk track, "Too Much Paranoia", which is as much experimentation as it is punk, is so replete with humor that it's impossible to hate. And it only sticks around for 2 minutes. And there's little doubt that Black Francis was thinking about "Shrivel Up" during nearly every session on Doolittle.

The first time I really listened to Are We Not Men was in the form of a cassette. I can't think of a more devolved form to listen to music on. The quality was poor, easily degenerated and, ultimately so fragile to border on decomposable. In other words, it would quickly devolve.

To many, Devo is a joke. Guys from Ohio who wore upside down planters and took "nerd rock" to a new level. To those who were in from the beginning we knew that it was more than that. If comedy had an ironic equivalent in music, it was Devo. Just a few years out of releasing his brilliant "Here Come the Warm Jets" Brian Eno recognized the Op Art meets Pop Music (The Cars would make this more accessible the same year) and signed on as producer. The result was a record that would be the true soundtrack to post-punk new wavers and pave the way for the likes of Laurie Anderson and Adam Ant. Where there was Bowie and XTC and the like, Devo wrapped it all in the coldness of a casio player. Challenging but never off-putting, this album was the true marker of the ascendence of New Wave.
It was dada, it was art. It's sublime.

Grade: A+
ASide: Uncontrollable Urge, Mongoloid, Come Back Jonee
BlindSide: Jocko Homo, Gut Feeling (Mothersbaugh sounds more like he's aping Jagger than on Satisfaction and the song itself sounds like it could have been written by Ocasek)

Zack Attack: Day 5 of the ICU

For me, this was the strangest of all days so far. I didn't see Zach at all. Beth's sister had to go home this morning and Zoe isn't allowed in the icu.
She and I dropped Beth off at Cedars and raced over to Ballet/Tap class. I couldn't be prouder of my daughter. She embraces every experience like it's the greatest thing she's ever seen. That kid relishes life, man. It's going to be weird being the father of a son. I just get girls, you know? I've had two and each of them were sparkling jewels in my otherwise sephardic eye.

Zoe has been terrific during the entire affair, but to her, I fear, babies live in the hospital for a week when they are born. This is her norm...

Beth spent about 3 hours with Zack. Fed him. Hung out with him. She says he's amazing.

I bet.

As I drove to pick her up at the hospital and get both of them home (it's rainy and Beth needs to recuperate) I thought, hmm...my kid was born last week but we have to visit him in a hospital. It's like mail order. We've seen the item but it isn't in stock yet. They're still putting it together. Like a sofa you'd get at Pottery Barn. You love it, it's comfy, you bought it, you PAID for it, but it'll still take 4-6 weeks to arrive.

With Liz, her diagnosis came so late in her newness that we had already gotten used to living with her. Or maybe that experience has prepared me for letting a hospital take care of my kid. I don't know.

I just know that I'm sitting here, typing this and thinking, wow, 6 miles away, in a plastic incubator, my son is sleeping.

That just isn't right. I really want him home.

Just what is this blog, anyway?

There might be some of you who are new to this blog and started reading for the Zack Attack series. Hi!
This blog is actually sort of antiquated and quaint nowadays with the world moving over to Facebook.
Lord knows I certainly partake in that. But I also love blogging. I had one when Liz was in the hospital, one for Zoe's gestation, one for her first few years, I like the format. It's like my own magazine where I am content provider and editor and it's also a diary or repository.

This blog took it's name from the concept of "sevens". The earliest concept was to enlist other bloggers to look at the world the way our bodies shed skin. How do things change every seven years? If you go wayyyy back to the first pages you will see that I tried to do that. But I couldn't stick with it.
Then it became a marker of events that took place during the Obama election which I volunteered for.

Then I had an idea: I wanted to listen to every single U2 record in a row and review them all. That was fun and fed in to my own personal obsessive compulsiveness. And I kept doing it.
before I knew it, this blog was 90% music reviews and 10% whatever else I threw up here. In this week's case, it was about Zachary Lulu and the difficulties we are experiencing with him.

It could change any time but for now it's a blast and I love it. I hope you'll stick around but if you don't, that's cool. I'll be here.

I promise not to make you sit through much more Kiss oriented music. I am almost done with that but I can only take it in small doses.
No. Next up?
Devo!
I'm pretty psyched. The whole point of the project is to look at the catalog of a band that has been around for a long time but is somehow still relevant. Devo's new release allowed me to explore them, just as REM's upcoming release did them.

So, leave a comment, have some matzoh ball soup, knock back a few and welcome to Septenary.

Allen

Kissening Post: Ace Frehley - Second Sighting

Ace Frehley - Second Sighting - 1988

So, what did we learn from last year's outing, Ace?
Not much, apparently. But why should he? First off, he's ACE FREHLEY, universally accepted "most talented musician" in the original Kiss quartet.
Secondly, this is 1988, not 1998 or even 2008. Hair metal hadn't been swept away by Nirvana yet and there was no reason to think that it would. The well was no where near dry.
Thirdly, spending 10 years studying at the feet of the master of self-promotion, Gene Simmons, can teach you only one thing, if nothing else: Balls out hubris. If YOU like it, they MUST buy it.
But Ace is no Gene. He believes in the first article as much or more than the other two. So, his hubris is sadly misplaced. He's a fine musician but as an arbiter of pop taste, he's a drunk. The album has all the pitfalls and trappings of the era; processed drums, high pitch testicle squeezing vocals, muddy mix, nonsense songs. It's an excuse to waste people's time and money.
So, Second Sighting is Frehley's Comet part 2. And the first trip wasn't that great to begin with.

Grade: F+
ASide:
BlindSide: Loser in a Fight
DownSide: Time Ain't Running Out, It's Over Now...ugh, there's not enough room to list the badness on this record.

Kissening Post: Vinnie Vincent Invasion - Vinnie Vincent Invasion

Vinnie Vincent Invasion - Vinnie Vincent Invasion - 1986

This album is really all about how fast Vinnie can shred. There are shades of Ratt, VH, you name it, it's all in there.
Ya got your songs about how hard they rock, "Boyz Are Gonna Rock", about how sexfull they are, "Shoot You Full of Love", "Do You Wanna Make Love?", how Whitesnake-y they are , "No Substitute", (a song I kind of enjoy) it's all in there and it's all something you've heard before.
The last track, "Invasion", was designed to loop at the end of a vinyl pressing so it would never end unless you pulled the needle up. On every other recording it's three minutes of this siren sounding monotony. I appreciate the former, the latter makes me want to punch a baby.

This is as generic a late 80s metal album as you'll ever hear, Bereft of subtlety, absent style, lacking song-craft, any one of the tracks could have fallen off a teen-comedy soundtrack. Probably did. This record was made for frustrated, parking lot dwelling, 15 year old zitheads. These people are now 40 and part of the ruling class. Any wonder we're in the shape we are?

Grade D
ASide: Boyz Are Gonna Rock
BlindSide: No Substitute (This is just me, I know it sucks)
DownSide: Animal, Back on the Streets, I Wanna Be Your Victim (Not sure there's ever been a metal track this dull before)