The Karl Hendricks Trio - 'A Gesture of Kindness' (Fiasco/Peas Kor)

This is the last Karl Hendricks Trio record with the original, 'classic' lineup, as Tim Parker soon left and formed a great band called Vehicle Flips for awhile, before leaving Pittsburgh entirely. I wonder what happened to him? I used to know him, when I was a plucky kid, and he was a pretty cool dude. If all you take the first sentence here as your only source, then you might think it was Parker who steered the Trio towards a more pop-based, catchy direction, and that his departure was already imminent here, because A Gesture of Kindness mostly sheds the pop hooks which Buick Electra is so saturated in, and trends towards a more subdued style of melodic work. Although the album artwork boasts of 'snappy toe-tappers', this album steers far closer to the sound of mid-90s indie rock; you can hear an influence from bands like Slint, the For Carnation, and Silkworm. This style actually suits the more introspective and somber side of Karl's lyrics, which are in full force here. The album closer, 'Your Damned Impertinence', runs over nine minutes (EPIC!), built around a very plodding, moody indie rock line which would really date this if it wasn't such a good track. There's an irony to the lyrics -  he's singing, through clenched teeth, a love song about how he enjoys the act of being frustrated, and when it explodes into the rocking-out parts, there's a thrill of release, an anthemic lift, and a genuine justification of the relationship between the lyrics and the musical style. Also (mostly) absent this time is Wayno; Chris Ware takes over cover art duties here, which is certainly a lovely aesthetic, though Wayno does the cover of the included lyric book, and it resembles a classic zine 'mini'. Typed out in Xeroxed glory, Karl's lyrics here can be read more easily than ever before and a dark bitterness seems to have crept in. The glorious, romantic optimism of 'Painted My Heart' or 'Nowhere But Here' is absent, and an ultimately deeper (though initially less inspiring) frustration with relationships and love has emerged. I think I listen to Karl's music to feel young and inspired - to remember the way I approached the universe at age 17 - so that's one of the reasons I rarely dust off A Gesture of Kindness. Twenty years later, I can really feel some of these observations resonating with me, because I needed to suffer my own miseries of love/life to connect with these songs. The rockers are fast and furious, and the fidelity of this pressing leaves a bit to be desired - the first side in particular was either mastered or pressed poorly, as the sound is blown out and muffled, and way too bassy. On the more aggressive numbers this is really problematic, but when things slow down for 'The Dress You Bought in Cleveland', over which Karl mourns a relationship from a classic male perspective (yet devoid of any misogyny), the space really echoes well. The 1-2 punch of 'Desperate Drunken Artist' and 'Breaktaking First Novel' shows his turn towards the world of literature; he spent his later years teaching creative writing, and it was in a literature class that he gave me this copy of A Gesture of Kindness, making it a truly self-fulfilling title. I don't have any of the later records, which is not to indicate that I didn't always enjoy the Trio (and later the Karl Hendricks Rock Band) whenever I saw them. I hope that if anyone is actually reading these writeups, then maybe some new people will be turned on to the man's words and music. RIP.

Game Theory - 'Blaze of Glory' (Rational)

'I never wanted to be tough', sings Scott Miller as the first line on this record, and that's sort of a career manifesto. It's not his debut release - there's the wonderful Alternate Learning LP from '81 - but it's the first one by Game Theory, and I've always viewed this as the Scott Miller band, so I take the Alternate Learning - Game Theory - Loud Family lineage as one more or less unbroken band (with apologies to Donette Thayer's later songwriting contributions). And it's impressive how fully-formed his vision is here. It begins with a snippet of more experimental sounds (like most GT records) before leading off with the one-two punch of 'Something to Show' and 'Tin Scarecrow', both brassy and buoyant. And the Sparks-like rave-up 'White Blues' follows, which ain't a bad tune either. Game Theory are such an exemplary band to me because they managed to sound very much of their milieu while being completely singular and remarkable at the same time - the cream of the crop, the crop in this case being early 80s college rock, or new wave, or Pasiley underground or whatever you want to call it. From this classification, I put them in the same league as This Heat, or the Art Ensemble of Chicago, or Animal Collective - brilliance within a vague framework of the then-'now' sound. The whole Paisley Underground thing I think came later and Game Theory were only really tangentially related to those neo-psych warriors; here, the psychedelia is restricted more or less to the lyrics, as the music is mostly bouncy post-punk with synth punctuations. Miller's voice has always been bright and somewhat effeminate (and an acquired taste which many people I've tried to turn on to his songwriting have never been able to develop), so any of the aggro edges from the fast-paced songs and bashing guitars are softened by this. This, like many first albums, is just a calling card for what's to come later with bigger and better production, which isn't meant to diminish the songwriting within; 'Bad Year at UCLA' is one of the earliest out-and-out classics by Miller,  and 'Stupid Heart' should make all the best-of mixtapes. His lyrics aren't yet as creative in terms of wordplay as what will come in the following decade, but even when grappling with the confusion of romantic feelings that takes place in one's early 20s, he displays a remarkable prescience and irony ('Date With an Angel'; 'All I Want is Everything'). I find myself listening to this just as much as the other ones, despite it's 'early' and 'rough' edges. Unfortunately my copy is packaged only in a plain 12" sleeve, so I'm missing part of the package.

Deerhunter - 'Microcastle/Weird Era Cont.' (Kranky)

I fell in love with Microcastle while falling asleep to it every night on earphones, during a tumultuous period of my own life. Bradford Cox's subtle songs really spoke to me then - I began to imagine deep rivers of melancholy underneath what would otherwise be simple, even gothy lyrics. This is a 'mellow' album, akin to low-key classics like Mekons Journey to the End of the Night or Big Star's third album. That's not to say Deerhunter doesn't function as the exploratory rock band they established themselves as in previous releases - especially on side 2 - but that there's less of a bass-led groove here, and this is a record more concerned with melody, lyrics and texture than jamming out. Maybe this explains my love for Microcastle - even though it's a 'breakout' album, it's somewhat of a departure. The record opens with 'Cover Me (Slowly)', a slow instrumental intro, starting the theme that's expanded in 'Agoraphobia'. This immediately marks a distinct change from Cryptograms-era Deerhunter - it's much more dry, more precise, and almost overly mild. Actually, it sounds just like the song 'AT&T' by Pavement, and this might also be why I fell in love with it. Microcastle veers between songs of desolation and strange, missing nostalgia, always rooted in pain and loss. 'Little Kids' is a built around an addictive melody, with a guitar riff that could be sing-song cute in another context. It's a song that paints a dark portrait of adolescence, which slowly ascends into a thick sheet of soundhaze without ever letting go of it's sing-along chorus. Most of the delivery on Microcastle is slow and restrained; the image of death lingers over everything, but you have to really work for it. The title cut is a beautiful minimalist sketch built around Cox's voice and an electric guitar which, when it finally explodes into the full-band stomp, has quite a payload. 'Calvary Scars' continues this wobbly, sparse delivery, letting the guitar overtones quilt up behind the voice; 'Green Jacket' fades to almost nothingness. The flipside starts with the melting shimmery 'Activa' before breaking into 'Nothing Ever Happened', the clear 'single' from the record. This twisting tune is driven by a strong bassline and it feels like a holdover from Cryptograms - not the waxed-paper vision of the rest of the album, but an appropriate inclusion anyway. The tune ends with a dizzying, descending guitar line that has traces of the Feelies around the edges. The jangle creeps in throughout the album, sometimes just as colour and sometimes as structure. 'Never Stops' and 'Saved by Old Times' both employ a confident 4/4 drive around their moaning, yearning tales of seasonal affective disorder and living in the past. A great album,yeah, but it's only half the package; like Cryptograms, Kranky is making sure I get my money's worth of Deerhunter for this purchase. Weird Era Cont. was thrown into this as a second LP, intended to be some sort of bonus album to combat leaked mp3s, or something like that. It's a bit of a Dead Letter Office, consisting (I guess) of Microcastle outtakes, but it's still pretty solid. The most successful tracks are fast rockers, such as  'Focus Group' and 'Operation', yet they're still holding a more stripped-down feel than anything on the regular album, which suggests that these tracks are unfinished. But a less polished Deerhunter is still nice; the sketches are lovely. 'Cicadas' attains a nearly free-jazz clatter; 'Ghost Outfit' is little more than a synth experiment, but interludes are lovely; see side 2's 'Slow Swords' for a real mood piece. These instrumental jams recall the ambient/song dichotomy of Cryptograms, though 'Weird Era' sounds more like No Neck Blues Band and 'Moon Witch Cartridge' is kinda goofy. 'Vox Celeste' brings out the more shoegazer qualities of their work, with vocals melting into a sea of reverb (but the vibe is still good, good). It's brother, 'Vox Humana' starts with big Phil Spector drums, which slowly recede into the distance as the mid-range gloom takes charge, subduing Cox's semi-spoken vocals under the warm reverb. The whole thing ends with a bubbly, melting version of 'Calvary Scars', thus tying the two LPs together into a conceptual whole.

Buzzcocks - 'A Different Kind of Tension' (I.R.S.)

The Buzzcocks are certainly a great singles band but their albums are probably just as good. I admit that I rarely pull this one out, except I somehow keep thinking this is the one with 'Moving Away from the Pulsebeat' (it's not -- I don't have that one). It does have 'I Believe' which is another 7-minute tune, because this is the Buzzcocks at the turn of decade, trying to branch out and explore Shelley's long-standing interest in Krautrock, electronic music, etc. Or at least we have rumblings of that, if not an abrupt direction change. He does deliver some 'atmospheric keyboards' here but repetition is still the prime directive. Side A (or 'The Rose on the Chocolate Box', as the label subtitles it) finds three Steve Diggle tunes, including the beautiful 'Mad Mad Judy' which climaxes with a brilliantly psychedelic riff-feast. Side B (or 'The Thorn Underneath that Rose') has the cryptic 'Money' which seems to be about changes people go through, but throws it's hands up in disgust under a strangely classic rock-sounding riff. 'Hollow Inside' is a minor key meandering, though actually quite focused. If there's one point where I think A Different Kind of Tension fails, it's the title track. This is a conceptual song attempting to pair commands in opposition to one another, and has a stupid vocoder sound (which probably sounded awesome at the time). But no fault to Shelley for trying; it's 'I Believe' where he turns the lens inward and spills things all over the vinyl. Fair enough -- I appreciate the changes. It's 1980, after all -- instead of 'Boredom' and 'What Do I Get?' , Shelley waxes patience in 'You Say You Don't Love Me' and 'I Don't Know What to Do With My Life'. Deep philosophy yeah, but didn't everyone confront Thatcherism in their own way? But as his voice rings out at the end, "It... my... life!"