Anodyne
Sunday, September 11, 2016
 
"[A]lbums that put the tattered decadence and artistic foundering of legendary songwriters on full display: Leonard Cohen’s Death of a Ladies Man, Gene Clark’s No Other, and Nilsson’s own Pussy Cats. Almost despite themselves, each of these flamboyantly overproduced extravaganzas has a irreducible core of sadness, making the overkill layers of backing vocals and horn sections, and session pros jamming, shimmer with an evocative poignancy even when in a conventional sense, they kind of suck. Listeners get to vicariously experience the thrill of heedlessly burning through entertainment industry money, and recklessly destroying brain cells with substance abuse in the futile process of searching for a creative spark.

It’s a very specific sort of emotional vibe—luxury-line desperation—but if you’ve acquired a taste for it, it can make for sublime listening."


- posted by cjb @ 7:58 PM


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