easycure

I completely agree, instead (Zione, lately we haven’t been getting along so well :-D) ..I would have written exactly the same arguments as you.. really a broken record; in the previous one they were still a bit overrated, let’s admit it: that sound halfway between PIL and Gang of Four wasn’t exactly the novelty of the century, but tracks like Killing, which at least tried to be modern, were remarkable. In this, there’s not a hint of real creative effort.

Alright, I better understand your point of view, and indeed you are to be admired for how much passion and involvement you exude regarding what you talk about. Since we share the same passion in that sense, I still hold my opinion: that is to say, you have projected too much onto an album that derives its beauty from simplicity, even thematically, in my opinion. Much respect nonetheless, easy.

The use of Synth and other electronic instruments is indeed completely different from the use of bands like Joy Division (which you carelessly associate with this album). While they indicate inhuman torment, atrocious coldness, and industrial sounds for morbid tales of drugs and violence, here they rather suggest a disorienting reflectiveness, a romantic dreaming light-years away from Curtis's nightmares (though obviously akin in era and thus in sound canons). Furthermore, it’s a matter of method, not merit; your rather pretentious tone is irritating as it doesn’t align at all with the album in question, which is a simple record, nonetheless direct even in its depth, essentially pop (in the best sense of the term). Finally, even your bibliographical references are at least dubious: Robert Smith has been with Mary since he was 15, and it doesn’t seem there’s any supporting evidence that it was such a troubled love... if anything, Robert Smith's obsession is time and what it entails for love... but it's an obsession here more contemplated than existentially suffered.

I didn’t like it. This is a classic case, in my opinion of course, where the critic projects into the work what they want to see, without it actually representing anything of what the work truly is. I obviously don’t agree with "Enciclopedia poletti," where I read that Seventeen Seconds is among the worst of The Cure, I really don’t know (I’ve read many more positive critiques than negative), for me it’s the best of the so-called dark trilogy, but for exactly the opposite reason that your review relies on: namely, that it’s fundamentally the most pop album, without falling into the overly cliché dark styles of spoiled bourgeois teenagers mired in existential crises with no substance (like much of the dark or pseudo-dark production from that period). In fact, the album that most connects to Joy Division is Faith, which was composed after Ian Curtis’s death. This is a calm and subtle record, melancholic but far from gloomy... it talks about love, it’s true, but in the witty and savvy tone of an artist coming out of their adolescent phase, where love does indeed cause suffering, but certainly not in "Leopardian" terms as you would have it. It is a visceral album, but far from morbid and paranoid; instead, it’s dreamy and suspended, not carnal and violent like Pornography will be.

Beautiful. The Litfiba on acid were the best (not to mention the only decent ones).

Thank you. Production and arrangements are obviously more defined.. here they are independent, there they are under A&M with a billion-dollar production attached :-D ..anyway, I don’t hear them as particularly different, it simply seems to me like a natural evolution, no upheaval, therefore the style is already there, no particular change of direction. But clearly, everyone hears their own thing, opinions ;-)

that reverberated sound, coming from afar, those structures far from linear, those guitars full of low tones, communicate destabilization, restlessness, more than a desire for emancipation, and are light-years away from the theatrical (and thematically naive) gloom of Sabbath's works. Soundgarden are immensely more disillusioned (like all of Grunge). All this is clearly observable up to Louder than Love, but also in tracks like Head Down, Feel on Black Days, Limowreck from Superunknown. Finally, it wasn't Eddy Cilia who said that here their style is already outlined; I said it: it seems to me that there are no substantial differences from what they will produce later. That the tracks are more sparse and shorter means little: it is obvious that a band matures and pushes forward its style, but certainly in their case, it doesn’t seem to me that anything is drastically changed from what was already hinted at here.

As for Entering, I said that the RHYTHM takes from Bauhaus, and it’s not just similar, it’s the same :-D ..besides that, it’s true, it’s a discussion that can be extended to all of Grunge precisely because Grunge is indeed a movement that develops in the 80s, and from which it evidently cannot detach itself, so it’s not a matter of "having something in common" with the new wave; this might seem like a question of mere arrangements, or anyway formal devices. What I'm talking about is expressiveness: it’s obvious that Soundgarden's approach is more rooted in Hard rock, but that goes without saying because they, like most grunge bands, start from a Hard Rock approach, relying on the stylistic traits and interpretations of Hard Rock. But their intent, their expression, what they communicate, is THIS that cannot ignore the influence of the darker, more nihilistic 80s (or late 70s).

beautiful. the singer's interpretation has never really made me connect with this band. I need to catch up.

You forgot about the enormous influence of the '80s: as Eddy Cilia says, "Soundgarden draw from Black Sabbath but are unthinkable without Joy Division." Their music is much darker and more nihilistic than their '70s references. "Entering," among other things, clearly takes the rhythm from "Bela Lugosi's Dead" by Bauhaus. Moreover, I don’t think they are poorly defined at all... this EP underwent three years of maturation (Soundgarden dates back to '84), and their path already seems quite defined to me, albeit perhaps sparser but also more eclectic than in some of the subsequent albums.