Tuxedomoon
Cabin in the Sky

Ah, memory, what a wonderful thing... it was the distant 1987 when I eagerly held in my hands what I thought was simply the fifth LP of Tuxedomoon (beyond the dozens of singles and mixes), the excellent You, but to my bitter surprise, it was the last one. By that time, the band had lost the warm Chinese-origin singer Winston Tong (who last appeared only for the fleeting and beautiful In a Manner of Speaking, on Holy Wars three years earlier), but above all, one of the two indispensable genius-founders of the group: the legendary violinist-guitarist Blaine L. Reininger, had been gone for a while.
The other founder, though, the keyboardist-saxophonist (and now only singer) Steven Brown, managed to craft an album of almost heartrending beauty and elegance, thanks to new additions like Luc van Lieshout on wind instruments, or old glories like the faithful and powerful bassist Peter Principle. But despite a tour filled with glory and honors (they played at the Rolling Stone in Milan), Tuxedomoon was destined to disband, and You to remain their last long-distance work.
Sure, leaving aside live performances, many more or less posthumous compilations (Divine, Pinheads on the Move, Solve et Coagula) have appeared, and the group even reformed to better record one of these: The Ghost Sonata, with the cathedral of Ancona on the cover, one of their EPIC MASTERPIECES. But beyond these more or less praiseworthy initiatives, the band remained in somnium at least until 1997, the year of release of a decidedly curious instrumental work: Joeboy in Mexico. Under false pretenses, the atmospheres, actually more jazzy than Latin, and the sounds with the typical trademark of the Brown-Principle pair, accompanied by local musicians, could be recognized. Sure, only them; Tuxedomoon was still far away.
Yet occasionally the boys (now in their fifties) still reunited, even with the prodigal son Reininger. In 2001, during one of these evenings, at Villa Arconati in Bollate (MI) to be precise, I had the honor of interviewing Steven Brown, who, evidently satisfied with his performance (as well as with himself), declared: "and you'll see that soon a new Tuxedomoon album will come out, with all those who have participated in this great adventure: Principle, Reininger, Van Lieshout." I was stunned, and asked "even Winston Tong?", he took on a frown and, quoting, replied "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know" (did you catch the quote? It's from L’Etranger). The interview then appeared in the fanzine Petali Viola.
Today, almost three years after that statement, I was definitively convinced that I had been fooled: the only studio material release had been yet another posthumous compilation Soundtracks / Urban Leisure. That old fox Steven Brown had grossly exaggerated or perhaps by now the old boys argued too often to still work together, or still, their honesty was such that, faced with an aging loss of talent, they preferred not to cover themselves in shame. You can therefore imagine my amazement seeing Cabin in the Sky in record stores, a title, among other things, of an old anti-racist film from '43 by Vincente Minnelli...
From the notes on the elegant black digipack cover, it's clear that Brown hadn't lied: they are them, the two legendary founders with Principle, Van Lieshout, and Geduldig, always a hidden member of the band, responsible for the "visual effects". In addition to them, several collaborators, among whom some DJs and even John McEntire of Tortoise!. It is a very strange project, conceived and produced in Italy, in Cagli, Marche, even three tracks have Italian titles (one is the neologism Annuncialto). But is it really inspiration? So there was no decline in talent?
Sure it's impressive to hear the bass line of A Home Away, soon doubled by Van Lieshout's horn: time seems to have stopped 13 years earlier... I feel like humming "I’m seeding the clouds today". Even Brown's voice is so fresh and assured, the melancholy melody full of that spleen that always characterized them. Strategic pauses, a brief singing in French interrupting the English, but the piece ends almost suddenly, leaving a sense of incompleteness. Oh well, it will only be an introduction to the album, also because the oboe of the subsequent Baron Brown really captures the depths of the psyche. There is also the violin, great Blaine! From the cover notes, among the composers, Tong's name even peeks out, and here the joy is boundless, one of the album's peaks. The track, however, a almost-Balkan syncopated and sophisticated danceable with synthetic accordion, intrigues more than it excites. A gypsy-swing that more than anything else makes things clear: we are the only American band capable of doing such things.
The atmosphere becomes deep, earnest, and vibrant with the third track, the aforementioned Annuncialto. A deep synth sound supports the usual Principle bass and a timid and sickly piano. Then the harmonica enters, in a dark track for those who appreciate the group's darker side, an instrumental with a desolate and oppressive atmosphere. It would not have been out of place on Suite en Sous-sol. Well done Reininger and Brown, well done Tuxedomoon, your talent is real! Well... the electronic and cheerful beginning of the next Diario di un Egoista quickly changes that thought. It's not so much the music, a sort of electronic dance with a smooth sauce, but the singing that leaves one perplexed: in a halting Italian, with the word "amore" repeated a thousand times and with a nice "bastard" in the first verse, Steven Brown strings together an ironic pseudo-Latin macho conquest of series B and slightly illiterate ("a man like I"). The irony is obvious, but it doesn't save from a sense of self-indulgence.
The subsequent La più Bella leaves one even more perplexed, where it's unclear whether Brown or Reininger forces an old man through the streets of Cagli (widely thanked in the cover notes) to sing a folk song. The poor fellow tries to sketch a Fiorin Fiorello, but the sense of the operation truly escapes: psychological violence for aesthetic purposes? Cultural anthropology of recovery? Senile foolery? Reininger's violin tail doesn't save (and doesn't explain).
But suddenly some poignant piano notes make their appearance. There they are, one after the other: bass, horn, guitar, a forlorn melody on the repeated scale of the piano. It’s Cagli Five-0, melodically instrumental until the entrance of a devastating sax and sonic experiments at which they are masters. Excellent and abundant, as they say, but for Tuxedo lovers something already heard (don't the street Italian recordings resemble too much those of Martial / This Land on Pinheads on the Move?). Brown's sweet closing (sounds like a sax) is, however, contradicted by the electronic, DJ Hell-affected beat, of Here ‘til X-Mas. The voice is deeper and hoarser than ever, Reininger's violin devastating, the jazz-inflected rhythm. The piece is playful and cacophonous, but also tough, convincing in its free-form developments between desert-like and delirious. The Tuxedomoon of 2000!
Even more disco beat and super-effected voice for Chinese Mike, a piece of psychedelic techno-jazz divided into two parts, with electronic reworking by Marc Collin and Aksak Maboul. When delirium dominates, the piece calms down, and an acoustic guitar, a violin, and a piano quell it, although vocal distortions still push from below. A reggae tempo gives new life and a sax solo now sends everything into metaphysics, for a perhaps slightly difficult piece, but certainly one of the strengths of the album and the group's entire latest production. A truly poignant piano, soon doubled by an equally devastating violin, closes the piece, meaning opens the subsequent La più Bella Reprise, where the sampled voice of the aforementioned old man is absorbed and incorporated by the two geniuses in a sort of step forward in melodic (and harmonic) research so wonderfully accomplished on The Ghost Sonata. In short... at least this way, the operation gains meaning! Too bad for the only two and a half minutes, too few.
We proceed. The Island begins with noisy cacophonies and various effects until the entrance of a clarinet. However, the track seems not to detach from a series of somewhat pompous sonic experiments. To be listened to under the influence of hashish. But an electronic and Caribbean-like beat makes its entrance with Misty Blue. Although the rhythm is smooth, the result of Reininger's voice subjected to echo (in a tone taken straight from Bowie) and the cleverly distributed electronics, in addition to a spine-chilling sax, is extremely pleasant, leading to inner disorientation, to the abandonment of a wandering soul. A catchy piece, almost commercial, but absolutely not trivial. Well done!
But an incredibly distorted guitar breaks the spell. A tribal percussion supports blasts of electronics, the super-production of a DJ can be sensed (Hell, in this case too), beyond McEntire's somewhat alternative mix. Piano in jazz scale, muted horns, vocal loops, the piece explodes bright, although tormented by effects. It's Luther Blisset, the quintessential collective entity, free participation of free members in a raucous and clumsy orgiastic feast, where words (in English and Italian) leave the sense they find. «No one writes these things down. I will write them. No one writes them because there is no time. I will make time», freedom becomes a flag, sensitivity turned into a fortress. Here we are indeed faced with something never heard before, where the sixties' anarchy adds to today's electronic destabilization.
Other effects announce the closing track, Annuncialto Redux. Echoes, reverberations, light flangers, bring back some of that seriousness that is a must in Tuxedomoon and that here is often missing. Indeed, Cabin in the Sky closes like this, with this meditative yet fragmented instrumental of effects (the production is by Tarwater). A record that forgets the claustrophobic paranoia that we liked so much on You, to be influenced by the solar and jazzy atmospheres found on Joeboy in Mexico.
An album at times more a child of craft than of inspiration, but, when focused, deep, sharp, disconcerting. Because it is not easy to remain within the tradition and still propose something new, something surprisingly new. The old is dead, but not completely, the new is born in its track, but we didn't expect it. Well done Tuxedomoon. Thank you for coming back.