I have the day off and so, gentle reader, you are treated to a review a day early! Sadly our streak of four-star albums is over, but this next record is still a good one.
Disc 1670 is…Crocodiles
Artist: Echo and the Bunnymen
Year of Release: 1980
What’s up with the Cover? A group of disaffected English youths sitting around in the woods. This group have left their car headlights on, presumably to aid in their intended frolic among the autumn leaves. It will be a long walk home once the battery dies.
How I Came To Know It: I’ve heard of this band for a long time, but never checked them out until my friend Nick bought me this record as a birthday present several years ago. Thanks, Nick!
How It Stacks Up: I have two Echo and the Bunnymen albums, and “Crocodiles” comes in second place.
Rating: 3 stars
I imagine that Echo and the Bunnymen were a broody lot to go to high school with. A lot of trench coats and sallow faces from not getting enough sun. However, they were also the kids that if you got to knew them were pretty interesting, if a little awkward once the crowd got too big.
“Crocodiles” is Echo and the Bunnymen’s first album, but it demonstrates a surprising level of musical innovation and maturity. The record feels fully formed, and I immediately got the impression the band had a solid vision. Sometimes debut albums are exploratory as the band tries to figure out who they are. “Crocodiles” is the youthful energy of a band who knows exactly where they’re going. Or at least that’s how it seemed to me – I generally approach art in as non-biographical a way as possible.
The record has elements of punk rock in it, but it is punk rock desperately wishing it were New Wave, if it could just shake off all that sadness. They never do shake it off, but that’s OK, because that is a big part of what draws you in. The rawness is an open wound that you don’t immediately want to bandage because it is fascinating just watching the blood well up.
There is an effort in here to be anthemic, but the anthems are absentminded, and distracted, defined more by Les Pattinson’s amazing work on the bass than anything going on in the guitar or vocals. It isn’t driving music, it’s music for sitting in the passenger seat, staring out the side window and watching the English countryside flow by. There was a part of me that kept waiting to be swept up into the experience, but it isn’t music designed to do that. It’s an ocean of sound, but it is not for swimming so much as being submerged.
Production-wise there is a lot going on. Bells tinkle here and there, and the drums, guitar and bass often feel like they’re having a friendly competition to find space rather than cooperating to play a tune. It is a testament to the band’s talent that this sometimes-discordant approach to the arrangements ends up as something cohesive.
I should note at this point that this is NOT how I usually like my music arranged. I prefer straight-no chaser arrangements and the deliberately jarring compositions are against my inclinations. At the same time, I couldn’t deny they know what they’re doing.
Lyrically I didn’t love it, and I had a hard time sorting through the mix to hear what lead singer Ian McCulloch was getting on about. The exception was “Villiers Terrace” which sounds like a rager of a party, with a lot of ill-advised drug use. What’s going on up at Villiers Terrace, you ask? – this sort of thing:
“People rolling 'round on your carpet
Biting wool and pulling string
You said people rolled on carpet
But I never thought they'd do those things”
It sounds like a few hangovers in the morning, and maybe one or two people at the hospital getting all that wool pumped out of their stomachs.
I dig Pattinson’s bass on this tune as well, and as I re-familiarized myself with “Crocodiles” I realized that the more I focused on the bass the more enjoyable the record became.
Despite all the innovation, I found this record hard to relate to an emotional level. Admittedly my listens happened while I was out running and out driving, and neither experience lends itself to this style of music. While Echo and the Bunnymen have the angst down good and proper here, I needed a bit more genuine heart at the core of the experience. Still good by virtue of the innovation and musical wizardry, but short of great.
Best tracks: Going Up, Villier’s Terrace, Happy Death Men
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