Thin White Rope
In the Spanish Cave

I am about to draft a medium-short review of "In the Spanish Cave" (also known as "Captain Long Brown Finger In The Spanish Cave"), third pillar of the career of the Thin White Rope, not before having properly documented myself on the band's biography, tracing, among other things, its reference context, and not before having read the lyrics of the songs that make up the album.

First of all, "In the Spanish Cave" (released by Frontier Records, an independent record label located in the Sun Valley, a Los Angeles neighborhood, in March 1988, the same month as "Surfer Rosa" by the Pixies, who operate, on the other hand, on the East Coast of the United States) is configured as a very varied work, divided between a melodic psychobilly (of American brand, à la Reverend Horton Heat), expertly dirtied by the voice of Guy Kyser, jangle pop echoes, and a certain heavy sound of Seattle origin [even though Thin White Rope, formed in 1984, and named after a William Burroughs phrase, conceived as a metaphor for sperm, and included in the novel "The Naked Lunch", from 1959, are Californians - as could be inferred from the place of recording - therefore frequenting the same latitudes as the future flag bearers of the so-called "desert rock", the Kyuss].

The spoken word of "Ahr Skidar" evokes southern scenarios, yet without the rhetoric of the genre. The preceding tracks are powerful: "Ring" (like the "Timing" which will come later on the album) features a rhythmic-melodic progress à la R.E.M. of albums like "Document" and the contemporary "Green" (especially "Timing", with its first guitar notes, closely resembles "Orange Crush" by the group from Athens, Georgia); in "It's Ok" the influence of "Rumble" (1958) by Link Wray, instrumental progenitor of "grungy" riffs, is palpable.
But these - "Ring" and "It's Ok" - serve as an antechamber to the best that is yet to come. "Red Sun", probably the peak of the album, is an extraordinary track for its structure and cinematic breath, fundamentally due to the entrance, at a certain point, towards the end, of trumpets reminiscent of Morricone's lesson. "Munich Eunich" (not present in the original lineup, but introduced in a reissue) is a nervous sketch with spastic rhythms and a sing-song vocal line, culminating in a searing "two notes" electric, making it the most unruly episode of the entire batch (in its reincarnation, precisely, reissued, "second").
The country aftertaste permeating the album is ideally related to the sounds of bands like 16 Horsepower, which not coincidentally would form a few years later in the same Los Angeles.

Opening the second side of the original LP, "Elsie Crashed the Party", the more dizzying moment, heir of punk rock lent to heavy metal, takes the Motorhead and puts them at the service of storytelling.
A breath of fresh air, a moment of respite, arrives with a ballad, which however does not renounce neurosis: "Astronomy", a sinister and searing neo-noir vignette.
The last two titles of the LP, "Wand" (split by a full-blown scream in the style of Iggy Pop from stooge-iana memoria... "TV Eye", move over!) and "July" (embellished by a slightly muted organ background) close beautifully a very enjoyable album through its contaminations, which converge into a compact style by which to be overwhelmed.

The sung-recited stories by Guy Kyser represent the right vehicle for the creation of a mythology that the art cover (stunning!) hints at, and which involves engines, scorching desert and Texan and Californian scenarios, as well as aquatic settings; border guards, and, in general, people not to be trusted. The lyrics are often short, essential, skeletal, like the shipwreck and the skulls that inhabit it on the cover.

Rating: 8.5/10

PS. The title of the album is a probable reference to the eponymous novel (dating back to 1936) by British author Geoffrey Household, who would die on October 4, 1988, a few months after the release of the album itself.