Laurie Anderson
Big Science

THE REVIEW

Uh-oh! We are pointed out that this review also appears (in whole or in part) in "I 500 dischi fondamentali del rock" by Mucchio Extra.

The most unlikely hit of the '90s?
You need to think about it for a long time and then choose from a rather substantial list, since in the decade we said goodbye to 6 years ago, there were quite a few absolutely unpredictable hits at the time of their release. But if you ask which song in the '80s, with its chart-topping success, provoked the most amazement, "O superman" effortlessly outshines the scant competition: eight minutes and twenty-one seconds of recitative voice over a very minimal electronic backdrop, a stressful immersion in the collective American unconsciousness (an infinitesimal fragment of the nearly eight-hour multimedia performance called United States I-IV), balancing between mystery and satire.

Anguish split by a smile that suddenly flashes:

"...when love is gone there's always force. And when force is gone, there's always justice. And when justice is gone, there's always mom....".

And perhaps that is the entire secret of Laurie Anderson: in the warm-hearted pulse at the center of music which throughout her career (the great Mister Heartbreaker from 1984; then Strange Angels from '89, and Bright Red from '94) would become more accessible. Avant-garde has never seemed so close to the life, dreams, and paranoias of the common man. Between structural simplicity and content exuberance.
'Big Science' is a rare weave of filtered voices and solemn keyboards, discreet percussion, flute, saxophone, and a violin that Laurie herself invented, with a tape instead of a bow and a magnetic head instead of strings.

The phrase inscribed on the tape is: "ethics is the esthetics of the future".
From the future, this album still seems to come, almost 25 years after its release... this recording took effort.... if you don't want to make fun of me, leave comments.. otherwise... leave them anyway... the sexy teen is always here.. with you... cheers