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Once upon a time, there was a band, Sparklehorse (a degenerate band, in a mathematical sense, practically composed of just one person, Mark Linkous) that one fine day pulled an album with a rather original name out of the hat:
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This album spoke of hearts of darkness, tears on fresh fruit, and had as the title of one of its key tracks a phrase spoken by Roberto Benigni in Daunbailò (E' un "Triste e Meraviglioso Mondo, it's a "Sad and Beautiful World").
Perhaps due to the bizarre title (which very much recalled Tom Waits' Swordfishtrombones, one of his idols, along with the aforementioned Roberto Benigni), perhaps due to the beautiful music it contained (a slightly acidic and very evocative country/folk), the album was noticed by insiders and the leader of a very popular band at the time, Radiohead.
It was precisely they who one day, as a sign of esteem, decided to take them (him) on tour across England, as a supporting band.
And here begins the story of the album I am about to review.
It was indeed during one of the London stops of this tour that Nemesis (I imagine you know it as the envy of the gods towards human fortunes) made its appearance on the scene.
It appeared one night in the form of, involuntarily it seems, an overdose of antidepressants and tranquilizers by Linkous. And the resulting coma, at first glance, irreversible.
At that point, at the time of Linkous's emergency hospitalization at Saint Mary’s Clinic in London, like in Sliding Doors, there were two possibilities for the future of the story:
- The heroic death of another victim of youthful malaise, and a new Nick Drake for future commemorations
- An unexpected recovery, and a guy who finds himself reviewing the second Sparklehorse album after seven years on a music review exchange site.
Good Morning Spider, an album that was born precisely from that traumatic London experience of Linkous (after the incident he remained paralyzed for an entire year in a wheelchair before regaining the use of his legs), has as its declared sources of inspiration two albums by Tom Waits: the aforementioned Swordfishtrombones and Bone Machine.
And it is soaked with the Tom Waits philosophy of Bone Machine ("It’s nice sometimes to feel like a bug that everyone can crush," well, good for him) throughout the album.
An album that begins with a very strong impact: extremely fast and violent guitar strumming and a distorted voice (Pig: "I want to be a Pig, I want to fuck a car"). It then proceeds with two very sweet tracks (Painbirs, a title reference to Tom Waits' Rainbirds, and Saint Mary, clearly inspired by the stay at the namesake clinic and dedicated to its medical staff) continues through "playful" (but only musically) ballads worthy of T. Rex by Marc Bolan (Sick Of Goodbye and Hundred Of Sparrows, the latter with the beautiful verse "You are worth thousands of sparrows.."), passing through some tracks of heartbreaking melancholy in my opinion with few comparisons in the musical panorama except perhaps Neil Young of the beautiful Philadelphia from the film of the same name (such as Sunshine: "I opened my eyes and saw the sunlight. It's been out all night to relax and unravel"; or Come on In, a waltz that feels like lieder, based on a prayer: "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray my soul to keep, if I should die before I wake, take it with You").
To understand the other dominant themes (the distance from home, the desire to escape from life when it seems life no longer wants you or eludes you, personal malaise extended to cosmic malaise leading to a sort of solidarity with all the animate and inanimate things in the universe) just translate other titles: Good Morning Spider, Box of Stars, Cruel Sun, Ghost of His Smile, and so on.
The last note is still on Linkous's voice.
It resembles, at least in some tracks, the voice of the aforesaid Marc Bolan (with his glam mold, as in Sick Of Goodbyes, a track that reminds me much, musically, of Telegram Sam by T. Rex).
What surely strikes (at least it was so for me) is how Linkous manages to modulate it (sometimes even with the aid of effects inserted in the recording studio, but I assure you that live it is equally suggestive) ensuring that his vocal tone oscillates between the masculine, the feminine, and even the childish in a graceful manner throughout all the songs.
Tracklist Lyrics and Samples
01 Pig (02:23)
p-i-g, oh, p-i-g
why don't you sing me that
pretty lullaby
then when you're singing great
pack it all up
I wanna new face right now
and I want it bad
I wanna new body that's strong
I'm a butchered cow
I wanna try and fly
I wanna try and die
I wanna be a pig
I wanna fuck a car
I wanna new face right now
and I want it bad
I wanna new body that's strong
I'm a butchered cow
I wanna be a stupid and shallow mutherfucker now
I wanna be a tough skinned bitch but I don't know how
I wanna be a shiny new baby with a spongy brain
I wanna be a horse full of fire that will never train
06 Box of Stars, Part One (00:33)
my bones wish to escape
and run along an alien expanse
to collapse from the heat
in a cartoonish heap
to sleep oh to sleep
09 Hey, Joe (03:06)
Hey joe
C'mon joe
Don't make that sad song
Any sadder than it already is
Hey jack
Get back
Get yourself together
C'mon c'mon
I know you're thinking about your nervous laugh
I know exactly what you're thinking of
Hey sid
No matter what you did
It can work out
Work out
No matter how you feel
Right now
Hey george
Do your chores
Don't feel sore
I know it's a lot more
Than just being poor
There's a heaven and there's a star for you
There's a heaven and there's a star for you
There's a heaven and there's a star for you
There's a star for you
There's a star for you
There's a star for you
14 Ghost of His Smile (03:12)
he don't get out much
these days
but I wouldn't call him
lazy
he sees the dawn sneak
into the room
and knows the dogs will
be up soon
and we thought that he was doing alright
as the sun chased down another night
and days carreen
like the waters
of a river rushing
to the sea
here she comes again
down the staircase
she never passes without
saying hello
and we thought that he was doing alright
and she says hello
I can't forget the ghost
I can't forget the ghost
I can't forget the ghost
of his smile
dogs will wag their tails
and birds will sing
hell it's hard world
for little things
and we thought that he was doing alright
I can't forget the ghost
I can't forget the ghost
I can't forget the ghost
of his smile
15 Hundreds of Sparrows (02:26)
every hair on your head is counted
you are worth hundreds of sparrows
the tree you planted has become fecund
with kamikaze hummingbirds
wings of hundreds of beats per second
of people whose wings are just a blur
afraid our eyes might become impaled
by their sharp and tiny beaks
I'm so sorry
my spirit's rarely in my body
it wanders through the dry country
looking for a good place to rest
your head upon my chest
and I can feel the pillow of your breast
you are worth hundreds of sparrows
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