Oxbow
Serenade In Red

After King of the Jews (1992), already a worthy representative of the oxbow-sound, and the noise-rocking Let Me Be a Woman (1995), we arrive at 1997 and the fourth album for the charming (and unchanged in line-up) quartet from San Francisco: "Serenade in Red", noir cover, 57:57, released by the prestigious SST Records (Minutemen, Husker Du, Black Flag, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr. and so on and so forth) and produced (as already Let Me Be a Woman) by the guru Albini.

If "King of the Jews" was a disturbing and formless descent into blinding darkness, and "Let Me Be a Woman" (don't worry, I'll review it shortly, darlings) was a vortex of noise acidity and high-level rock, "Serenade in Red" is finally the first Oxbow album to fully and comprehensively present all the minute, curious, and almost kaleidoscopic (albeit cohesive and compact) facets that compose the Oxbow-sound.

The album starts off strongly with "Over", a sort of intro, already dark and uneasy, yet in its own way exceedingly captivating and sensual. The record continues with the accelerator, and "Lucky" is perhaps the most noise-metal piece in Oxbow’s discography. Fast-paced and damned, the track continues, expands, and echoes with (Indo)European musical motifs, surprising. But the astonishment probably dominates the entire album. They seem like a kind of magicians with hats, managing to pull igniting rabbits out of a pure analog rock quartet, a bit noise, a bit doom, a bit of something indescribable like "Over" or "La Luna", but then they can throw in two small 'musical frescoes' like the two "Untitled" (the first solely bass and voice, the second dominated by piano and wind instruments), little gems that already demonstrate how Oxbow is having fun, adding to their rock sound base elements like piano, winds, and strings, which will find their most complete expression in the last incredible "The Narcotic Story".

As it approaches the end, the album maintains high levels, favoring more, like in a drunk -> hangover sequence, less furious, more sombre, almost melodramatic atmospheres (the start of Babydoll) that then peak in the concluding The Killer and Insane Asylum, both featuring a certain Jarboe (or maybe Lydia Lunch? The issue is rather mysterious). "The Killer" expresses at the highest levels the noir unease that was already hinted at from the (by now distant) cover. "Insane Asylum" is the ghost track of the album, and there couldn't be a better ghost track: a crazy and magnificent blues with Spanish flavors, with Eugene Robinson forgetting (it’s truly exhilarating) any concept of pitch, while the guitar desperately fights against the exquisite formality of the piano and organ. In conclusion, everything seems to return to noise (even if in blues rhythm). A scream from our gentle giant then silences everything. And the album ends.

It seems rather silly to say, but this, like practically all Oxbow records (how did they do it?), is to have, to listen to, to dissect and to be dissected by. It may not be the album suited to pick up dates (singing like Robinson will not make you appear sensual to many people), but who cares. First listen to Oxbow, then try to pick someone up. If you still feel like it, that is.