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I also struggled to open the internet this afternoon; the connection was worse than usual.
As if someone from above wanted to prevent me from speaking ill of the Syndicate's new album.
Well yes, friends and Debaserian colleagues: this will be a sacred disavowal. And I had a terrible struggle to come to this; but unfortunately, it is so.
I tried to listen to the work many times, which is completely atypical for me because I have always been used to trusting my musical instinct, writing reviews on the fly. As it happened, someone I hope remembers my page, with These Times album by Dream Syndicate released in 2019: a report written in a handful of minutes while listening to the individual songs for the first time. In fact, I remember very well not even reaching the end. I was too sure of that sound, so known, so recognizable and I went on smoothly, without obstacles, like a river in flood.
With The Universe Inside we are at the opposite end.
Many listens, with the utmost attention without letting myself be distracted by anything. By day, in the car, with headphones at home at night; seeking a minimal foothold, a convincing passage from which to try to climb back, to attempt a way out. But there was no possibility whatsoever.
And I am truly mortified, somehow embittered. I couldn't lie to myself by still speaking well of the album.
I have been following Steve Wynn for almost forty years, I get chills, believe me, typing his name because I love him madly, in all his many musical forays. Dozens and dozens of works that belong to my intellect, my soul, which I have tattooed in my heart, deep in my soul. Seen live on at least six occasions, complete with autographs, handshakes, heartfelt thanks for what the Los Angeles boy managed to convey and give to the boy from Domodossola. Total, unique emotions; those who, like me, love Music will understand very well.
Online I have read mostly positive reviews; which I obviously respect but don't understand. Because the new Dream Syndicate album, in my opinion, is not a Dream Syndicate album.
Ok agreed... by now Steve, Mark, and Dennis are seasoned sexagenarians who have nothing to prove. And they have thus decided to write an album recorded, it seems, in a single night, live, without overdubs (aside from Steve's voice in many passages loaded with effects). With Jason Victor on guitar and lifelong friend Chris Cacavas on keyboards.
And we come to the crux of the matter, the thing that in my opinion is most glaringly missing in the work. I am referring to the violent slashes, the KO-blows that Jason was able to bring to the Syndicate's sound at the time of their rebirth in 2012. A perpetual and continuous use of the distortion pedal, with a very acid six-string sound, which live takes on dizzying proportions; always aided in this mad work by the equally vehement execution of Steve himself.
The Universe Inside consists of only five songs for a total duration that nearly reaches a full hour.
The first track The Regulator exceeds twenty minutes; a deep sense of boredom in listening to the track. I never thought I would associate the word boredom with something written by my friend Steve. But as I said before, I can't lie to myself, I can't ignore my feelings felt from the first listen. Of the other tracks, I don't even remember the titles: another personal alarm bell regarding my appreciation. Sure, I could read the titles on the CD in my possession but we are at the starting point: lying, not ignoring my adverse feelings.
Staggering album, extremely difficult for me. Improvised, free from patterns, very free...but terribly tedious.
I took way too long to decide to pan it... but I had hoped for a distant mirage, at this point in the writing, unlikely.
And so I hold on tightly to the epochal episodes of our own; the works of the eighties, "The Days of Wine and Roses" foremost. And that live, that double live which, in my opinion, is the greatest concert album ever recorded...That’s What You Always Say...
But I will always have affection for Steve; and at the next concert, if the occasion arises, I will show him my customary Primus t-shirt asking him if he likes it. And he, I'm sure, will reply as he did before, "I don't like Primus"...but it doesn't matter!!!
Ad Maiora.
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