Luke Haines once again confirms himself as the most eccentric personality in the UK alternative scene. Ever since he has been on the scene with the Servants and then from 1991 with the Auteurs, he has always been recognized as one of the UK's most brilliant musicians and songwriters, but at the same time, he has always demonstrated, he has always wanted to be, he is certainly what we can define as a true outsider. When the Auteurs released their second album, 'Now I'm A Cowboy', an album that was one of the most significant of the early nineties in England and was released at the same time as various bands like Oasis, Blur, Suede, and the so-called Brit-pop movement were literally taking off, Luke literally put everything in fuck. He broke both ankles, the group had to cancel the already planned European tour. He declared he did it on purpose because he didn’t feel like going on tour and wanted to cash in the insurance money.

Confined to a wheelchair for about a year, he recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London with the production of Steve Albini, the third Auteurs album, 'After Murder Park'; just a year later, he gave life to his first side-project, Baader-Meinhof (so named after the eponymous terrorist group). He began to radically innovate his sound by introducing elements of funk and electronic music and somehow definitively distanced himself from what was mainstream music in the UK during that period. Needless to say, the Baader-Meinhof project also raised more than a few perplexities and discussions for the content of the lyrics and texts, essentially dedicated to sensitive topics such as terrorism and the criminal actions of the Red Army Faction, led by Andreas Baader and Ulrike Meinhof.

Since then, Luke Haines has built and then destroyed everything he has done and in a certain way all that has been music in the UK over the past twenty-five years. But it couldn’t be otherwise for a character like him. His solo career (in the meantime he also created another parallel project with former Jesus and Mary Chain member John Moore: Black Box Recorder) is absolutely controversial with a lot of episodes seemingly divergent from each other. Apparently, he has never followed a defined modus operandi throughout his artistic productions. He is a 'wild' artist, under certain aspects therefore also 'punk'. Above all, he is a great son of a bitch, one who is not aligned and does whatever the fuck he likes. The UK music scene's antihero. One from whom every time you don’t know what to expect.

For example, the latest record, 'Smash the System' (what a better title for one of his albums…), released on Cherry Red Records last week, is practically his first no-concept album in six years. A long period in which Luke has released in sequence four concept albums and an EP. '9 1/2 Psychedelic Meditations on British Wrestling of the 1970s & Early '80s' (2011), essentially arrangements of psychedelic music narrating fictional stories about old wrestling wrestlers (among them: Mark Rocco, Gorgeous George, Mick McManus, Pat Roach...). 'Rock and Roll Animals' (2013), whose title evidently recalls Lou Reed’s 1974 live album, has as its main concept a story about what Luke Haines wanted to define as 'outsiders' but represented in the form of animals. The three protagonists of the 'story'? A cat named Gene Vincent, a badger named Nick Lowe, and a fox named Jimmy Pursey. 'New York in the '70s' (2014) is a concept album about New York City in the seventies and full of references to famous figures like Lou Reed (who died only a few months before), Jim Carroll, Jimi Hendrix, the photographer Bill Cunningham... The album is heavily influenced by the sound of Suicide by Alan Vega and Martin Rev, a constant point of reference in the career of Luke Haines, but from this moment onwards increasingly relevant. As can be evinced in the minimalist wave and obsessive, claustrophobic 'British Nuclear Bunkers' (2015). A fantastic album, announced by a radio message, 'This is a BBC emergency broadcast. We have been informed of a possible nuclear attack against the country...' The album practically develops a sci-fi concept, a fiction story made of lights and mainly (obviously) sounds. Ideally the sequel, seventy years later, to what Orson Welles did announcing on CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System) the arrival of Martians on Earth and more precisely in New Jersey near a farm in Grover's Mill. In reality, he was reading, as it is well known, 'The War of the Worlds' by H.G. Wells, but a lot of people panicked and really believed they were under attack by alien forces...

The contents of the album are claustrophobic and frightening, the city of London is under attack and we are forced to stay crammed together in the underground of the city in the dark in situations of extreme survival without really knowing what is happening above our heads.

Idealistically closing the cycle, the schizo-rockabilly, 'Adventures In Dementia', a completely crazy EP in which Luke tells a story where the main protagonists are Mark E Smith and the Fall who while on tour have a car accident with a car driven by the skinhead and singer of the 'white power' band Skrewdriver, Ian Stuart...

I realize this description might appear long and too detailed, but in truth all these contents are useful to fully understand this new album. Everything I have written contains 'keys' to interpret and unravel the seemingly cryptic knots of the album.

Indeed, 'Smash The System' immediately opens by recalling Ulrike Meinhof in a track with wave-like and at the same time repetitive sounds at the limits of the obsessive. 'Ulrike Meinhof’s Brain Is Missing' tells in a detailed and raw manner one of the most controversial stories in German history over the last fifty years: the disappearance of Ulrike Meinhof’s brain. It happened right after her death and was found by her daughter Bettina only twenty-five years later in the warehouses of the University of Magdeburg. 'Black Bunny (Not Vince Taylor)' pays homage to Suicide and presents itself as an ideal sequel to Haines’ most recent works for its contents (immediate the reference to 'Rock and Roll Animals') and for the sounds. 'Ritual Magick' and 'Bomber Jacket' are two 'cruel' psychedelic ballads, visionary and hallucinated at the same time and played in a style that might remind one of some songs by that great genius Julian Cope. The same could actually also be said for the beautiful, 'The Incredible String Band', a strange and eccentric, dazed ballad with an unconventional kazoo solo. 'Marc Bolan Blues' is clearly a tribute to the great English rockstar and the parabola of T. Rex. With 'Bruce Lee, Roman Polanski and Me' and the lysergic and spatial (in almost a Spacemen 3 style) 'Cosmic Man' return the most claustrophobic sounds of 'British Nuclear Bunkers' and Luke resumes naming and listing a whole series of characters from the Hollywood world inserted from time to time in 'fiction' contexts. Something that is evidently also carried out in the title track, 'Smash The System', a piece of wave music in the style of the best Gary Numan and played with aggressive tones and the vibrant and obsessive sound of synths. Finally, a song that he probably wanted to dedicate to all of us and also to himself. A song that in fact poses and is a simple question, 'Are You Mad?'

Is the man who pretends to go against the system and destroy it into a thousand pieces crazy? The one who dreams of breaking it down. Who puts all his determination into it. Are we mad when swimming against the current? Who does not conform, who can be defined as a 'loose cannon'. Who is simply a rebel and who does not know they are, but also who knows they are and therefore tries to find and define themselves by confronting with outsider personalities with guts like those sung by Luke Haines in 'Rock and Roll Animals’? Are we perhaps ourselves animals? What animal would you like to be, to which species do you feel you belong? And what finally to say concerning Luke Haines?

Luke Haines is the man who has literally created and then destroyed music in the UK. Somehow he performs the same ritual even with himself, rebuilding and renewing himself every time. He is a person with a great sense of humor, which is never a bad thing, but above all, he is someone who knows how to look around and who possesses the ability to observe and judge, interpret, and analyze everything around him, the people around him and the world we live in, with a particular eye to that magical world of illusions of the so-called 'mainstream', paying homage to and at the same time also destroying the icons of the music world and the contents of pop culture. He is a brilliant writer, he also writes very interesting music reviews always expressing in a clear and unequivocal way his opinion without any hypocrisy, but especially contextualizing each single album according to who the artist or performer is and the contemporary musical scene and the past one, thus according to what our existences are. Luke Haines is someone who tells stories and knows how to tell them well. I enjoy listening to him.

I have nothing else to add, but I ideally want to conclude this review with what was the 'launch message' of the album and inviting all of you to literally follow his words and his invitation.

''Smash The System is both a magical ritual and an actual call to arms. So, sisters and brothers, fill all your psychic energy and summon our new Gods: Eric Bristow, Giant Haystacks and Brian Jacks. We implore you with our prayer.

We have sealed among us a blood pact with the menstrual blood of Ulrike Meinhof and have sounded our horn in honor of the mythical Black Bunny. Praise the power of the witch. Death to all hesitations. Realize yourselves, immediately! Vince Taylor is not dead! Exalt the vagina and always keep in your heart a little space for Marc (Bolan).

Do you like the Monkees? Yeah? Then let's smash the system. Let's do it.'

Tracklist

01   Ulrike Meinhof's Brain Is Missing (02:58)

02   Cosmic Man (03:25)

03   Smash The System (02:39)

04   Are You Mad? (02:05)

05   Black Bunny (I'm Not Vince Taylor) (04:46)

06   Ritual Magick (02:53)

07   Power Of The Witch (02:43)

08   Cosmic Man (Intro) (00:40)

09   Bomber Jacket (02:44)

10   Bruce Lee, Roman Polanski and Me (03:22)

11   Marc Bolan Blues (02:58)

12   The Incredible String Band (02:57)

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