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Rating: "Well, I would start by saying that..."
"...but what are you starting, what? Aren't you forgetting something?"
"Oh yes, it's true. The apologies, first. I had some apologies to make. And if not now, when?".
Sorry, Nick. For two things.
The first: I'm sorry if at first glance I mistook you for Shel Shapiro, on the cover.
The second: I'm sorry if I try to write a useless page, because a few precise words were enough for you to make any review unnecessary. You had already said everything, and you did it better.
"PURE POP FOR NOW PEOPLE".
At most, I could make an effort to say what I've always seen in that definition: Pure Pop... - is there a PURE form of Pop? How do you reach the essence of Pop? Is there a written formula? Or is there no math that applies to creativity?
No, that math doesn't exist. And it never will. No one can force the totally free Genius to follow the rules that makes you think of a Song like Tonight. And not only - after having thought it (words and notes and choirs, and what notes and what choirs), to also think of filling the second verse with the sound of a Spanish guitar replacing the words. Who could have thought of that solution? You can know all the rhythms, all the keys. Yet you'd never be able to bridge the gap that separates craft from crystalline Talent.
That's what I saw in that PURE.
But I also saw the audacity of the novice (even though Nick was not a rookie, even though the Brinsley Schwarz were not the classic beautiful meteor, even though absolute pearls like Nervous On The Road and Please Don't Ever Change cannot be forgotten). The audacity of someone who, a year before Jesus Of Cool, had come out with an EP entitled BOWI - well, dear Duke, you had just recorded LOW and didn't expect a worthy (...) response...? The irreverence of a small-great Hero of times when the boundaries between (Pub)Rock and Punk weren't so clear, of a class-'49 and yet so comfortable with the rhythm of that new beat, so comfortable as to become its Master. And only a Master could be the Man "behind" (but not always just in production) Records of Elvis Costello, Graham Parker, Joe Jackson, John Hiatt, Pretenders... and even partially, the list begins to weigh.
Someone who loved playing with all the incarnations of Rock'n'Roll so much, so much that he joked with the wardrobe and was - cover... - Paul Kantner, Phil Manzanera, and... Mike Rutherford...? at the same time.
But also someone who particularly loved the sound of breaking glass late at night ("I LOVE The Sound Of Breaking Glass"). I like it too, Nick, but I have to admit I prefer the atypical Funk you dedicated to it. Something I don't even need to catalog, all I need is that bass groove and that piano - yes, the piano, no less genius than the guitar of Tonight - to ask myself: "what was whirring in that Head of yours...?". And who knows.
Then of course, the years of the English "Glam(orous)" Rockers hadn't passed in vain and a Music For Money I could have listened to from Mott The Hoople, but Shake & Pop (what is more POP than Rock'n'Roll, after all...?) has the D.O.P. mark of a Pub Rock that would never have given up its glass of boogie.
Ah, but... no wait, wait... speaking of genres... and that strange thing that people rushed to call Reggae-Rock, assuming it exists, wasn't it "invented" by the Police - or at least many told us so? Yet, listening to No Reason... well, are we really sure...?
But there are few things I could summarize (and with how much effort) in ready-made definitions. In reality, it's pure songwriting-Nick Lowe's Style, this is the only definition. And you learn to recognize it only with a bit of familiarity. Little Hitler, Nutted By Reality, that unusual perfect alchemy of Rock and melodic intuition that has listening as the only possible verification. And that you come to recognize even in covers. So It Goes you'd listen to 10 times in a row, you'd never understand WHAT exactly makes it unique but at the end of the tenth listen you'd still be there repeating to yourself: "How beautiful is it, So It Goes...?".
And then I come to Marie Provost. Those chords, those choral parts of Dave Edmunds, that lyric (the story of the Diva that no one knew was dead in her apartment, and in the meantime had become a meal for her dog!)... it's immense. Here I prefer to improvise as hermetic, beautiful analyses and descriptions would be of no use. Sometimes the simplicity of 4/5 chords can be the hardest to explain.
And I think that a Record like this will never age, that it will always seem recorded half an hour ago.
Because those like Nick Lowe will always have the spirit of the novice.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
03 Little Hitler (03:02)
Little Hitler
What you doin'?
Is the passion inflamed again?
Little Hitler
Where you goin'?
Is it go-go night again tonight?
Ever searchin'
For the action
But the action don't want to know
I sit all alone you're a tough one
Little Hitler
What's the matter now?
Can't you settle for the center of attention?
Little Hitler,
Now I'm serious,
Let me guess while you knock me off the guest list.
As the world turns,
At the edge of night
And the seed all shot and sown
I'll make a little Hitler of my own
When the going gets tough, tough get going
Every now and then
I can see them running, running
You can talk to them
You can be short with them
But you'll get no change,
Only shootin' at 'em long-range
As the world turns,
At the edge of night
And the seed all shot and sown
I'll make a Little Hitler of my own
See you someday soon
Selfish pleasure, yeah
With the one I love
Little Hitler now
05 Tonight (03:59)
What a fabulous night
Look at the moon and stars are
shinin' bright
lt's a wondeful night all right
* Oh it's so heavenly
l could almost believe
It was made especially (Tonight)
There's a place that I know
A secret place where I sometimes go
If you wanna know where we'll go there
So don't hesitate
'Cause although we're late
We stll carry all the fears
Tonight, there will be no sorrow
Tonight, don't think about tomorrow
Tonight we'll do what must be done
So we won't be the only ones
Tonight, how can we fail to fall
Tonight, it's really magical
Tonight we're just a boy and girl
The only people inthe world tonight
* repeat
Tonight, there will be no sorrow
Tonight, don't think about tomorrow
Tonight we're just a boy and girl
The only people in the world
Tonight, how can we fail to fall
Tonight, it's really magical
Tonight we'll do what must be done
So we won't be the only ones tonight
06 So It Goes (02:33)
I remember the night the kid cut off his right arm
In a fit to save a bit of power
He got fifty thousand watts
In a big acoustic tower
Security is so tight tonight
Oh, they are ready for a tussle
Better keep your backstage passes
Cause the promoter has the muscle
And so it goes, and so it goes, and so it goes, and so it goes
But where it's going no one knows
In a tall building sit the head of all nations
Worthy men from Spain and Siam
All day discussions with the Russians
But they still went ahead and vetoed the plan
Now up to the U.S. representative
He's the one with the tired eyes
747 put him in that condition
Flying back from a peacekeeping mission
In the air there's aftershave lotion
In the wake of a snake bit Persian
On his arm is a skintight vision
Wondering why she aint mine she is whistling
But where it's going no one knows
07 No Reason (03:33)
Little dariin' don't look away
You don't have to be sad anymore
'Cause
* There ain't no reason
No single reason in the world
Little darlin' please dry your eyes this time
Don't you be sad to me
like you did before
'Cause
* repeat
Little darlin' I can understand your pain
There's too much confusion goin' round
and
* repeat
No reason in the world (repeat and fade)
08 36 Inches High (02:58)
Once I was a soldier
l rode on a big white horse
Silver pistols at my side
Carryin' the flags of war
And I Iost track of the men who fell
In the canon's roar
l never got over bein' a soldier
Once I was a tax man
Collectin' dollars and dimes
l heard the rich man grumble
I heard the poor man cry
Some few couldn't afford to pay
Were put to a shackle and key
l never got over bein' a tax man
Once I was a ruler
About twelve inches long
Three times me made a yardstick
36 inches high
36 inches high was l
36 inches high
i never got over 36 inches high
09 Marie Provost (02:50)
Mary Provost did not look her best
The day the cops bust into her loneiy nest
In the cheap hotel up
on Hollywood West July 29
She'd been lyin' there
for two or three weeks
The neighbors said
they never heard a squeak
For hungry eyes that couid not speak
Said even little doggie's have got to eat
She was winner
The became the doggie's dinner
She never meant that much to me
(But now I see) Oh poor Mary
Mary Provost was a movie queen
Mysterious angel of the silent screen
And run like the wind
the nation's young men steam
When Mary crossed the silent screen
Oh she came out west from New York
But when the talkies came
Mary just couldn't cope
Her public said Mary take a walk
All the way back to New York
Those twin balms didn't help her sleep
As her nights grew long
and her days grew bleak
It's all downhill
once you've passed your peak
Mary got ready for that last big sleep
The cops came in
and they looked around
Throwing up everywhere over
what they found
The handywork of Mary's little dachshund
That hungry little dachshund
Poor Mary, poor Mary, poor poor Mary
Poor Mary
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