•
Rating: "Pain deserves infinite respect, precise timing, and music to accompany it"
"Harmacy" is a broken piggy bank: there are the coins... and there are the pieces.
The coins are small treasures of music that the "greats" are not particularly interested in, because they (apparently) have little value: they have a slightly shabby shine, that of low fidelity, they don't care to show off, they don't indulge in virtuosity, in guitar finesse or sonic sophistication. Many are just the whispers of a boy with thick glasses, a bit awkward-looking, who you can't help but imagine locked in his bedroom, sitting on the floor writing love songs for a girl who, if she ever loved him, no longer does ("Perfect Way", "Willing To Wait"). Some of these coins have remained in his pocket as memories of some journey. Some seem to even come from the land of small dinosaurs ("Beauty On The Ride"), even though it is 1996 and a lot of time has passed. Others, finally, have the bittersweet taste of a nursery rhyme without a happy ending ("Ocean").
All, rare and precious, are just a few grams of guitar and voice. A gentle guitar and a gentle voice.
The pieces are sharp and rough songs, scattered everywhere, like marbles. And they seem like the usual pranks of Loewenstein, the most "pixian" mind of the group: almost as if wanting to let the guitars grind their teeth a little, after so much calmness. Almost as if wanting to make room for screams, alongside the whispers. Some pieces last just a little more than a cigarette puff to vent anger ("Love To Fight", "Crystal Gipsy"), others are shabby approaches, drafts of themes that find their beauty in not having been corrected ("Hillibilly II"), and others are just an excuse to have fun and make some noise (the cover of "I Smell A Rat").
"Harmacy" is like those glasses that, if hit, don't break, but become a mosaic, a spider web of hundreds of fragments, glued to each other, each different from the others. Maybe it is not the masterpiece of Sebadoh, and maybe it is too fragmented, too discontinuous, "inconsistent", but it is a record that makes you feel good listening to it.
It is a tangle of sadness and things that go or have gone wrong, where, however, there is also room for subtle irony, for a pinch of misogyny ("Look, baby, I'm not a mind reader: you're gonna have to tell me so you're lookin' down at your shoes again"), and for that desire, which sometimes you felt growing inside, to tell even the love of your life to go to hell ("The way you are, that's the worst thing you could do").
But, above all, there is that almost too empathetic sensitivity with which Barlow talks about difficulties and misunderstandings ("If there's a right thing to say, I'm sure I missed it by a mile"), lack of communication ("Silence's like disease, but I dare not say it hurts"), of impotence and frustration in the face of relationships that go to ruins without anyone really wanting it.
"Harmacy" is just the broken sign of an Irish pharmacy, but, perhaps, it is also a word and a place that do not exist (the "pain factory"?!), a place where, every so often, one cannot help but return.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
03 Ocean (02:46)
So you think you’re in the middle of the ocean
Stranded on an island of your own
Or stuck in the top of a mountain
Either way you’re gonna say you’re all alone
And I hesitate to say that you’re a liar
I never tell the truth myself
But I tried to chase you down and I got tired
So I’m leaving you to you or someone else
‘Cuz you never wanna hook up in the middle
And I’d meet you there to talk if you would show
But you answer every question with a riddle
And refuse to even choose to let me go
It used to be I’d tell you all my secrets
Giving you the credit you deserve
I guess you didn’t care to lose or keep it
And we never quite connected from the first
And I wish I had a way to make it better
To rearrange the world and make you smile
But it’s dumb to even think I had that power
And we haven’t been that close in a while
And I don’t even wanna try to name it
Explain it for the one who couldn’t care
‘Cuz all that matters is the way you choose to frame it
And I hesitate to say that you’re a liar
I never tell the truth myself
But I tried to chase you down and I got tired
So I’m leaving you to you or someone else
‘Cuz you never wanna hook up in the middle
And I’d meet you there to talk if you would show
But you answer every question with a riddle
And refuse to even choose to let me go
04 Nothing Like You (03:09)
If I’m right, sometimes I forget I might
Shallow as the brook out back
Bedtime stories that you can’t take back
Figure how to be a friend to you
God knows I want to
There’s a lot of girls in the world
That are nothing like you
There’s no need to condescend
Not knowing, careful to pretend
Give away your fucked-up friends
Tired news and damaged trends
Figure how to be a friend to you
God knows I want to
There’s a lot of girls in the world
That are nothing like you
If we play your games, won’t have time to play my games
Forget how to be myself, but now I’ve got it figured out
They’re nothing like you (X4)
09 Willing to Wait (03:32)
Willing To Wait
when you see him again
tell him everything that you told me
tell him that i'm still your friend
and maybe you would like to see me again
i'm willing to wait my turn to be with you
but i still have a lot to learn about me
and no one's sure if we should be together
but oh, when i saw you again
a beautiful friend, she opened up her heart and let me in
no, i cannot lie to you
i'm still in love with you
and i only wanna be with you
so when you see him again
tell him everything that you told me
we're more than friends
and maybe we should start again
maybe you could love me again
cause oh, when i saw you again
a beautiful friend, she opened up her heart and let me in
no, i cannot lie to you
i'm still in love with you
and i only wanna be with you
i only wanna be with you
12 Too Pure (03:46)
Is something missing in my touch?,
Like tension tugging at my smile,
If there's a right thing to say,
I'm sure I missed it by a mile,
Swallowed in some detail, heavy in my blood,
I wanna hold you close,
But i can't lift my arms up.
Is there a reason for this distance?
More than the drug that floats my days,
A nervous bug in my system,
Keeps me edgy and ashamed,
I've gotta say, never ever will forgive,
And never understood me,
But still tells me how to live,
It fits when i stretch,
And i stretch because i can.
I stretch until i'm sore,
And then i open up for more,
I do it out of habit not addiction,
And if i give it up, clean out my blood,
Will i still feel bored and disconnected?.
If i do it all for love,
Will i ever give enough?,
'Coz you can never be too pure or too connected,
You can never be too pure or too connected,
You can never be too pure.
14 Love to Fight (00:54)
I love sleeping, I love eating
When it’s boring, I love to fight
Anger, confusion, illusion, bullshit
Charmed the woman, drank the whisky
Just made history
Bullshit
I love you now
Loading comments slowly
