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Rating: «Disgust, disgust, frustration, and disgust. Only disgusting ideas come to mind! And if they're not disgusting ideas, they're ideas about disgust.» This is me: I haven't had great weeks lately. My reading is sluggish, studying, forget about it, social life is minimal. It won't surprise you to know that as soon as I tried to write a few lines about this album, everything that came out was even more unhealthy than those beginnings I usually use. Stories of cheap booze, youthful troubles, memories to forget: these are all that come to mind. This, and the recipe for peas alla casalinga (choose them fresh and tender, put them in a saucepan with "Olio Carli," salt, pepper, fresh garlic, and chopped pancetta, add water while cooking if needed).
Three days later, I realized that what I needed was right in front of my eyes. My complaints were exactly what I needed to talk about this album. Does life seem bad? Does your job seem bad? Are all your favorite albums so sad that you can't cheer up by listening to them? Do you hate people who laugh and are cheerful? Here's Gold.
Gold, 1995, is the second album by the Starflyer 59, a Californian band founded by Jason Martin. Martin is a good guy, always thanks Jesus Christ "our Lord and Savior" in every one of his albums, and in his nearly two-decade-long career, he has tackled various rock genres. Gold is a shoegaze album. Guitar-driven, solid, crystal clear, with always incredible clarity. Walls of sound, sharp and controlled noise, a rigorous power, an enveloping, mighty sound: the chaos we love, but always vivid and precise. Layers of feedback sweeping away sediments of disgust and discomfort from our thoughts. These Starflyer would be impressive even if they made the generic silliness we always listen to, but here we have a band that has found its own niche of originality within such a difficult genre. We are far from the traditional shoegaze stereotype, the "I'm melancholic and I'm thirty but I wish I were sixteen and life is sad" alternating with "life is beautiful, but I'm melancholic anyway." Here we have noise boy scouts erecting a small golden cathedral to be contemplated silently, letting us be submerged by the controlled chaos of the guitars.
I don't even know if that last metaphor makes sense, but I'll leave it there anyway. Oh yes, their nineties-esque videos are fabulous.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 A Housewife Love Song (04:12)
Tend the tables, put your houseguests away
Tend the tables for free and it's okay
Put your pockets in the drawers, sad and warm
Hey I will be right here
Tend the tables, broom the rats out for me
Tend the tables for free and it's okay
Put you pockets in the drawers, sad and warm
Hey I will be right here
(You're right)
Be my housewife love
(We'll write)
04 You're Mean (02:04)
you're mean
or so it seems
you've got everything
but the one I need
don't be cruel
it's so true
you've got everything
but the one I need
taking time I'll gain all your notice
truth in mind
you always turn and then gloat it
you're mean
10 Do You Ever Feel That Way (02:15)
do you wait here by the phone
do you ever feel at home
do you ever feel that way
do you ever feel that
I'll be here waiting diamond sold
come and wish we'll be home
do you ever feel that way
do you ever feel that
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