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Rating: "Black & White Minstrels 75-79" is the archaeological relic of the Monochrome Set's prehistory.
They are the British cult band that, with the masterpiece "Strange Boutique" in 1980, achieved the impossible feat of developing a coherent and immediately recognizable style, the result of an inexplicable alchemy between Canterbury, 60s pop, rose-tinted new-wave, French chanson, old-time cabaret, and a nice sprinkle of desert psychedelia.
Before this, the Monochrome Set were a relatively normal band (assuming you consider it "normal" to play such straightforward rock at the end of the 70s, in a time of peculiarities).
In this collection of singles predating their LP debut, the model is the most classic of classics: Lou Reed. His discreet, clear, straightforward, calm to the point of hypnosis rock, which he perfected starting from his experience with the Velvet Underground (particularly the third album) and, especially, with his early solo singles, is found in the sober "Inside Your Heart" and "White Noise", tender narcotic ballads that Boston-based Galaxie 500 would remember a decade later. Speaking of stylistic revivals, it's worth highlighting the heartfelt clarity of "Private Dick", a timeless masterpiece that draws on Neil Young and Jackson Browne to lay the foundations for the neo-psychedelia of bands like Dream Syndicate, Camper Van Beethoven, and Flaming Lips, with an eternal chorus so familiar it never gets boring, being consecrated as a classic. With the aforementioned tracks, the Monochrome Set pave, accidentally and unknowingly, the way for much contemporary indie-roots, detoxified from the excesses of the 80s and reconciled with the timeless classicism of the 70s.
But more than that decade, it's the one before that gets exhumed: the lively early 60s. "It's More Than Just Love" brings to mind "Locomotion", sunny beaches, water fights, carefreeness. But they do even better with "We Are Zarbie", a delightful novelty torn apart by electronically distorted fuzz and led by a beat-surf organ: we're halfway between Fleshtones and B52; "Lester Leaps In" is also smooth, though a bit bland.
The new-wave is distant, seemingly uninteresting to them, who at most limit themselves to mocking it, as in "Alphaville", which mimics Television, or as in "Silicon Carne", which does adopt that feverish and fatalistic approach that maybe constitutes the true common denominator of all musical experiences labeled as "new-wave", but it does so always with that mocking tone of a languid chansonnier, which will then be found in "Ici Les Enfants" on "Strange Boutique". This recovery of cultures alien to the Anglophone universe is not limited to Europe. The tireless experimentalism of these authentic wild cards of post-modern popular music smoothly travels to all corners of the Earth to give new guise to diverse musical languages: thus, without pause, from Turkey, invoked in the chanting "Eine Symphonie Des Grauens" to Argentina, honored in "Mr Bizzarro", a spectacular tango, entirely supported by a chilling percussion session, exotic extravagance with a dark undertone that even ethno-dark geniuses like Savage Republic never managed to match.
To seal the collection, a primordial version of the track "Monochrome Set", which would open "Strange Boutique" in a contagious tribalism and which here is instead proposed in a more syncopated and, all in all, more ordinary version.
Tracklist and Lyrics
05 Eine Symphonie Des Grauens (02:22)
I’m dead and dank and rotten
My arms are wrapped in cotton
My corpse loves you, let’s marry
(Get smart, once)Every night at sleepy time
(Get smart, twice)I hang my skin out on the line
(Get smart, sing) Oh, darling, would you be, be mine
[Chorus]
I’m in love, I think I’m in love]
I’m in love, I think I’m in love]
I’m in love, I think I’m in love]
I’m caught in a mesh of veins
My fingers and flesh and brains
My skull gives head, so let’s wed
(Get smart, once)Every night when all alone
(Get smart, twice)I drape my flesh around the phone
(Get smart, pray) Oh, darling, would you be my own
[Chorus]
Don’t cry, beautiful, it’s just a phase
To the father and the son and the holy ghost
I chant and I pray, I love
You know, God works in mysterious ways
To the father and the son and the holy ghost
I sing and I pray, I love
I’m soft and slightly stinking
My arms are small and shrinking
My lips kiss dirt, oh, let’s flirt
(Get smart, once)Every night at half past one
(Get smart, twice)There’s a little taste of things in come
(Get smart, chant) Oh, darling, can I be your son
[Chorus]
Don’t scream, baby, it’s just a coma
To the father and the son and the holy ghost
I chant and I pray, I love
You go to heaven, I go to Roma
To the father and the son and the holy ghost
I sing and I pray, I love
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