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For anyone who has ever wondered what sound a rhinoceros makes, the quietly menacing horn-toting hippopotamus, this first, surprising, solo endeavor by Adrian Belew comes to the rescue.
Anarchic hair, as if in revenge for the forced bundling imposed by age, a white wool nightshirt, a pockmarked face with theatrical expressiveness; the Adrian Belew of today, a natural counterpart to that Robert Fripp, on the stool at the corner of the stage, focused and above all disciplined.
The stylistic and personality contrast has fundamentally been the reason for the (artistic, of course) success of such a heterogeneous guitar duo, in duels between animality and geometry, noise and asepticism. Fripp's elitist intellectualism tainting itself with pop, dance electronics, reformulating a desecrating and very personal language that inhabits and transcends the consumable music of the '80s.
The work reviewed here is dated '82, placing itself in the period immediately following the crimsonian Discipline, also anticipating what will be heard later in "Beat" and "Three Of A Perfect Pair".
I say this for the few who might not know: Adrian Belew is a monster of skill, in singing as in guitar, a free and hard to classify character. Even if only for his daunting resume, it is undeniable that he has no limits except those he sets for himself.
The key to his work lies in the elaboration of a language that is free, yet accessible, that feeds on the most culturally deleterious muzak, but that speaks on multiple levels. Or perhaps here we simply find the sincerely naive approach of Belew to understand music, where free jazz counterpoints and synth pop, motorik rhythms and guitar diluted in relaxing ambient ("Naive Guitar", indeed).
What is missing here, though, is the much-touted "discipline" of Fripp, Belew roams freely in every direction, remaining faithful only to the improbable concept of rhinoceroses (The Lone Rhinoceros, a comically poignant ballad in which the guitar mimics its typical sound, is a bit of a summary of what has been said) and to the freak pop that recalls the irresistibly playful imaginative universe of Frank Zappa. (who, remember, was his discoverer)
"Swingline" whose saxophones initially mimic the nervousness of Red, then goes through very cheesy rhythms to return to a crimson-like sound in the dark persistence of the horns, pierced by Belew's guitar. "Addidas In Heat" is a cauldron of fusion, funk, and pseudo-avant-garde collage, the opener seems instead a parody of new wave, "Stop It" is amusing pop-jazz that, in the finale, shows, if it were needed, Belew's philosophy of non-seriousness.
Indeed, while it's impossible to overlook the work of the '80s King Crimson in the evaluation or even just in the listening approach, it must be said that although it is very easy to highlight the (enormous) musical contribution of Belew in this phase of the crimson king, here we are always talking about pop music.
Intellectual pop, disorienting pop, anarchic pop and ultimately aimed at an ideal audience with no reflection in reality (least of all with that of the '80s), but pop in form and content, in whose (own) theoretically limited registries it's discovered as vital and expressive.
For dinosaurs (and of course rhinoceroses) who appreciate being playful when visionary, for the young who prefer to be old to dissociate from common sense, for those who wear shoes of different colors, for those who go to the office after watching cartoons, for those who will not ponder the legitimacy of the five I've put up there, for those who are everyone or who want to be differently a nobody.
Ps: the melody in the chorus of "Swingline" is the one present in the video game "Crash Bandicoot", unless I'm wrong or I'm crazy.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Big Electric Cat (04:53)
She arrives like a limo
Smooth and moving
On the prowl through the crowd
To the beat of the city
She glows in the dark
Wherever she parks
Concrete crumbles and the night rumbles
Big electric cat
She dances through the street
Like the flame of a fire
Everybody's hypnotized
Everybody perspires
Even little children cry
Grown men shout
The dogs bark
The lights go out
Big electric cat
02 The Momur (03:44)
Late last night
I was speaking with my wife
when she turned into a momur
tried to put me uptight
I said "You don't scare me"
then she let out a scream
that's when my heart started jumpin'
like a broken t.v.
She was a momur and it was just like I told ya'
she said "You better watch out, I might bite a big hole in ya'"
The very next morning
I was watching cartoons
when I thought I saw a momur
it was you know who
well, she backed me in a corner
tried to kill me with a broom
and shouted personal remarks
from across the living room
She was a momur and it was just like I told ya'
she said "You better watch out, I might bite a big hole in ya'"
Late last night
I was speaking with my wife again
when she turned into a momur again
tried to put me uptight again
she took me favorite guitar
and she smashed it on the floor
when she danced around on top of it,
I thought I might get sore
She was momur
04 The Man in the Moon (03:50)
There I stood in the night
out on the broken pier
me with my feet in the sea
you with your face in the clouds,
the man in the moon
and as I heard your voice,
felt your laugh
flood across the broken pier
I wanted to die right then and there
You smiled down across the waves
as if to say to me
"Everything will be okay,
be strong and true"
and I felt your eyes
like the tide
pulling me out into the air
for a moment in time
you held me there,
father and son,
home again'
07 The Lone Rhinoceros (04:02)
I'm a lone rhinoceros
there ain't one hell of a lots of us
left in this world
I stand alone in my concrete cell
where people stare and toss me Coke cans
I guess it's better than being poached
but I'd give my horn just to see my homeland
I'm a lone rhinoceros
there ain't one hell of a lots of us
left in this world
They say I am ugly,
call me a beast
I hear them snicker
when I'm half asleep
Is beauty such a big commodity
I always heard it was only so deep
I'm a lone rhinoceros
there ain't one hell of a lots of us
left in this world
I know the zoos protect my species
they give me food, collect my feces
but I can't help it, I miss the past
I'll never again see my good old mudbath
08 Swingline (03:28)
Swingline throughout the backyards of the midwest
lean back, baby, in your seat on the train
look through the window pane
Look at that kid over there with no underwear
and a silly dog who doesn't care
his mother stretches to reach the clothes line
while a mean neighbor leans on the population sign
Non-stop through the backyards of the midwest
eavesdrop, baby, from your seat on the train
look through the window pane
Some kinda Buick left in a stream
it used to be somebody's' dream
a town stares at the summer heat waves
past a smooth afternoon,
ready to close for the day
10 Animal Grace (04:02)
Hey, the makings of a real event
he slices through the urban air,
immediate and confident
yes, he's riding on a sonic wave
defining a modern pose
arriving in the status age
I watched the animal grace
stir in his painted eyes
and spring into life on his face
Yes, the drama of a silent stage
his image commands respect
personifies style and taste
yes, he's magic on the t.v screen
illuminating living room walls,
the power of his frequency
I watched, they took the stage away
gone with the moving crowd
I felt so misplaced
left with my naive guitar
there in the dim parking lot
I saw him leave in a car
I stood in my place
and quietly waved
goodbye
to the animal grace
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