It's a fairly straightforward recipe: mix a handful of twangy spaghetti-western guitar riffs with a pair of rumbling Burundi Beat drummers, toss in assorted yips, yelps and yodels, and wrap it all up in gooey wad of time-tested bubblegum hooks. Now, tilt the whole works just off-center, and voila - you've got Antmusic.
A strange concoction in many ways when you think about it. It's a light, airy kind of ear candy that threatens to evaporate into the ether upon first listen. Yet, it demands repeated listenings, and seems to get better, grow stronger, with every revolution of of the turntable. The dual rhythms both compete with and complement one another, and the whole sound sinks into your brain and makes a home there.
For a few years, Adam & The Ants' Kings Of The Wild Frontier was my favorite album (eventually losing that crown to the Violent Femmes' debut LP); 35 years later, it's still a Top Ten pick. Adam would eventually go on to a solo career that could be described as spotty at best, with the occasional shining gem glistening among some pretty dire dreck. The early Adam & The Ants stuff from the late 1970s showed a lot of promise, but had not yet found the right balance of ingredients. By the time the band invited us to "try another flavor" on Kings, the recipe was just right.
The album opens with a stunning one-two punch: "Dog Eat Dog" and "Antmusic" are simply classics of the New Wave era and probably the strongest tracks on the album, but to let them overshadow the rest is to miss out on some truly outstanding songs. "Press Darlings," "Feed Me To The Lions" and "Los Rancheros" each are catchy, hook-filled confections that could have been hit singles themselves. But all is not just bouncy fun here in Antland: "Ants Invasion" strikes an eerie sci-fi pose, "Killer In The Home" ups the creepy factor, and "Physical (You're So)" is much darker here than even Trent Reznor could make it when he covered it years later.
It was with the first single after Kings Of The Wild Frontier that Adam & The Ants hit their absolute pinnacle, but "Stand And Deliver" would have to wait until Prince Charming to appear on an album, and by then The Ants were starting to lose steam. Kings Of The Wild Frontier belongs on anyone's short list of defining New Wave albums and still sees fairly regular airplay around these parts.
As we all do so often, I found myself the other day in a situation where, not long after a particularly frustrating interaction with another person - but certainly after the moment had actually passed - I thought of the perfect thing I should have said. I hate that. Here I stood with this wonderfully clever and bitingly witty, searingly sarcastic retort, about five minutes too late. The French call it esprit d'escalier, which translates to "the wit of the staircase." Literally, the thing you think to say as you are leaving down the stairs from the situation where you should have said it. The only thing more infuriating is that friend we all have who seems always to have that perfect thing to say at the tip of his or her tongue right at the exact moment to say it. They have the wit, they have the sarcasm, they have the timing, and they know it. If that friend were a band, he'd be The Monochrome Set.
Well before Adam Ant brought Antmusic to unsuspecting world, he had been in an art-school band called The B-Sides with Hornsey School of Art classmates Ganesh "Bid" Seshadri, Lester Square and Andy Warren. Much as Adam's first set of Ants would do years later to form Bow Wow Wow, so too did Bid, Square and Warren abandon The B-Sides in the late '70s to form The Monochrome Set. (Though he made some excellent music in those days, it seems Adam Ant did not play well with others!)
The Monochrome Set's sound is the sound of cool. Their ridiculously hummable tunes flow as smoothly and sweetly as honey, reminiscent of Bacharach and David's catchiest '60s lounge-pop. Bid's foggy velvet vocals slide perfectly over top this musical bedding, projecting images of high-class yet smokey nightclubs filled with bored-looking patrons scarcely deigning to converse with one another.
And oh! that wit: From clever song titles ("I'll Scry Instead") to incredibly erudite lyrics ("Don't dance the polka in a dhoti/And whistle the Rite of Spring/Don't recite Hamlet's soliloquy/While munching onion rings" from "Ten Don'ts For Honeymooners"), all of which are delivered in the same laconic, off-handed style, The Monochrome Set affected the perfect too-cool-to-care stance that would normally piss people off, if only they weren't so damned funny.
From 1979 through 1985, The Monochrome Set issued five albums and several singles worth of material, with 1982's Eligible Bachelors being the best of the bunch and a fine jumping-in point for those unfamiliar with the band (although you can't go wrong with any record with their name on it). There are also a few best-ofs and singles collections which serve as both introduction to and history of the band.
After a five-year hiatus, they returned to the record racks in 1990 with Dante's Casino, released at first only in Japan, where the band had always been hugely popular. When that album's import sales proved the audience was still there, several more albums followed. The band finally called it quits in 1998, although their website indicates plans for reunion gigs in February of 2011.
This week's NW4NW entry comes from The Monochrome Set's 1982 masterpiece Eligible Bachelors. Here is the clip for "The Jet Set Junta" - enjoy!
One of the more popular sub-categories of early '80s New Wave was the "New Romantic" scene. Embracing both music and fashion, the New Romantics were direct descendants of the mid-'70s Glam rockers; indeed, Bryan Ferry, Marc Bolan, David Bowie and the like were the icons the New Romantics often aspired to replicate. Think of bands like ABC, early Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet, Adam Ant and Culture Club as examples of the New Romantic scene who most successfully reached mainstream ears. But there were many, many more New Romantic bands flying beneath the radar.
One of the earliest was Classix Nouveaux. Formed from the Poly Styrene-less ashes of legendary punk wailers X-Ray Spex, Classix Nouveaux recorded three albums between 1981 and 1983; as is often the case, their debut (self-titled in the US, called Night People in the UK) is far and away the best of the three.
In fact, it was their first single, "Guilty," and the corresponding video that first brought them to the attention of the music world. The breezily danceable keyboard pop and nearly gothic vocal style were quite agreeable, but oh the visuals!
It's hard to take your eyes off of singer Sal Solo: tall, thin, pale and bald, Solo underscored his naturally odd appearance by presenting himself as a glammed-up version of Nosferatu. It's a not easily forgotten sight. The overall look of the video would be aped by many a New Romantic to come, from the colorful hazy soft-focus effects to the "Seinfeld's puffy shirt" costumes worn by the oh-so-serious looking extras doing their best Mummenschanz dances. All in all, it's giddy fun, and the song really is fantastic.
And here it is for your viewing pleasure. Your New Wave for the New Week, Classix Nouveaux's "Guilty":
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