Jun

6

One Vancouver retailer described Tom Holliston’s ‘Boy in Tub; Rabbit’ thusly - ‘put Captain Beefheart’s brain in Nick Lowe’s body, and then challenge that monster to write a Pointed Sticks album’ - nailed it! A gem of a CD, ‘Boy in Tub’ shows some terrific songwriting and musicianship, yet yields all of the expected Holliston quirkiness. ‘Smart Money’ is the hardest rocker, which has Holliston doing a hilarious Jello Biafra - ‘Ask anybody if they’ve heard me sing they’ll all say I sound like the lizard king’; while ‘Ladies Man’ is a terrific and catchy pop song. Add an homage to baseballer Bill ‘Spaceman’ Lee and the topical ‘Celebrities on the Internet’ and you have a record that would easily chart on college radio, given half a chance. ‘If 9/26 is Your Birthday’ clearly channels Captain Van Vliet himself, while ‘Entomologist Pondering’ is a dreamy minor masterpiece. ‘Boy in Tub; Rabbit’ is a mature and accomplished work that deserves to reach a wider audience.

Mar

21

‘Brute Reason’ is an interesting release in the Bernard Szajner catalog, not least because of three collaborations with Howard DeVoto during what was arguably his most creative period. Devoto had broken up the influential, economically unsuccesful group Magazine in 1981, and recorded these three songs with Szajner at the same time he was recording his first solo album, ‘Jerky Versions of A Dream’. Those tracks featuring DeVoto’s lyrics and voice could very well be quirky outtakes from a Magazine recording session, featuring pulsing synth rhythms and melody lines, typical 80’s slapbass (think Tony Levin), dramatic guitar chord changes, wacky song structures, and of course DeVoto’s unique vocal affectations tangled around such lyric wordsmithery as the epigramatic ‘When you take chances sometimes chances are what you get’ to the marvelously obtuse ‘He’s got a skullful of kerosene and shortcuts balanced on his neck’.

The rest of the tracks are solid experimental new-wave synth rock, with the title track being a highlight, a percussive groove featuring the superb Taiko drum master Joji Hirota on drums and wordless vocals, enhanced by wild saxophone and keyboards fills. ‘Domestic Casualty’ references ‘Execute’ from Sjazner’s influential ‘Some Deaths Take Forever’, a heavier reworking that builds to a crescendo using pounding drums,multi-tracked Fripp-ish guitars and compelling synths to build to a similar frightening conclusion as the original. The album closes with the slow insistent ‘The Snark’, a compelling and languid instrumental featuring saxophone, keyboards, guitar and two bass guitars. The artwork includes a dreamy photo of Bernard with his most influential invention, the laser harp, surrounded by all his gear, a near-iconic image. Overall the album is melodramatic, cinematic even, with solid standout performances from all the assembled musicians, with particular credit to guitarist Xavier Geronimi and bassist Bernard Paganotti, as well as maestro Szajner’s strong keyboard work and compositions.

An album that makes more sense with repeated listenings, ‘Brute Reason’ is recommended browsing for fans of Howard DeVoto, Magazine, King Crimson, Brian Eno, prog-rock, synth-wave or experimental rock in general.

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