THE CHRISTGAU CONSUMER GUIDE

THE CHRISTGAU CONSUMER GUIDE

Robert Christgau

THE BAND; "Northern Lights — Southern Cross" (Capitol):: I have always found myself put off by the sprung quality of the Band's music — the sense that if someone were to undo the catch its works would be propelled forth in all directions. Instead of energizing the impulse to piece together the lyrics — in the manner of the Stones, not to mention Bob Dylan — the sound of albums like "Big Pink" and "Stage Fright" (not "The Band," though, or "The Basement Tapes") tends to reinforce their own metaphorical impenetrability. So the pure comeliness of every melody on this album led to an immediate infatuation. As I listened to the words, however, infatuation turned to mild affection, for once again a parallelism in force. The best of these songs is sentimental; the worst (the two that are set in the city) are grossly sentimental. If Garth Hudson hadn't turned into a synthesizer natural the music might not even prevail in the end, although it does. I just wish, though, that more of the promise o)f that enormously suggestive title had been fulfilled.

A Minus.

"BAY CITY ROLLERS" (Arista):: I was hoping I wouldn't have to mention this, but the single has made the pu$h to the top. So...what you figured, too bland to be offensive yet, more Partridge Family than OsmPnd;s. Noormal geeze just like yew. •. C.

ALBERT BROOKS: "A Star Is Bought" (Asylum) :: Brooks apparently lives in a milieu so saturated with comedy that laughter itself seems redundant, perhaps even vulgar. All that matters is the idea of Funny. In just that sense, this album is very Funny; fortunately; it is also good for a modicum of laughs. Reminiscent in tone of "Are You on Something?" by Ray D'Ariano, now a successful promo man at MCA, where he keeps everyone in the office in stitches. B Plus.

"ERIC CARMEN" (Arista) :: It was the theory of those who considered "Starting Over" the only good Raspberries album that the secret ingredient was new bassist Scott McCarl, who played Lennon to Carmen's McCartney. Now that the man is flying solo, the question becomes: What good is one second-hand Wing?

C Plus.

JOHN DENVER: "Windsong" (RCA Victor) :? Why haven't all those textual analysts who figured out that Paul was dead and Bob Dylan a junkie applied themselves to the song sequence "Two Shots," "I'm Sorry," and "Fly Away," a minitriptych that proves (rilly) that John and Annie are on the rocks!! Too morbid a thought, I bet. Upgraded for documentary interest. *

C Minus.

JACKIE DeSHANNON: "New Arrangement*' (Columbia) :: As an American songwriter (transplanted) who has escaped the confessional mode, 'and as a woman who can sing about subjects other than men, DeShannon exemplifies several healthy trends. The main thing this well-made record reveals, however, is an intelligent professionalism that matters about as much as a surge in enrollment in creative writing classes or women's liberation for female executives.

B Minus.

ARETHA FRANKLIN: "You" (Atlantic) :: Does the curiously unfocused effect of this album reflect Aretha's inability tp direct her own career? Or is»it ju$t the way the bass is mixed? Or are the two the same?

B Minus.

JOHN HIATT: "Overcoats" (Epic) :: I admit to a weakness for loony lyrical surrealist protest rockers. And I admiC that this one tends to go soft when he tries to go poetic. I even admit that he has a voice many would consider worse than no voice at all (although that's one of the charms of the type). But I insist that anyone who can declaim about killing an ant with his guitar "underneath romantic Indiana stars"1 deserves a shot at lea<ding-man status in Fort Wayne. B.

DELBERT McCLINTON: "Victim of Life's Circumstances" (ABC)::

Any cracker who can get arrested for "cuttin' up som,e honky with that bonehandled knife" is worthy of this perfect new-rockabilly,title. Which suggests the album beneath the title has been unjustly put away, as it turns out. Sentence suspended. C Plus., m

THE MIGHTY CLOUDS OF JOY: "Kickin'" (ABC) :: Dave Crawford's debut production with this group explored the spiritual affinities between showbiz gospel and sweet studio soul.

This one exploits shared commercial asininities. Don't be fooled if AB£ gets the A plus exception, "Mighty High," onto deejay turntables; JoeLigon singing ?'You Are So Beautiful" is even more oppressive than Billy Preston.

CPlus.

FRANKIE MILLER: "The Rock" (Chrysalis) :: If, like me, you have a taste for English soul singers who have taste in American soul exemplars, you will be pleased to learn that Henry McCullough does a helluva Steve Cropper imitation. But Miller is no Joe Cocker n (not to mention Toots Hibbert) (not to mention...) and he was better off letting Allen Toussaintcontribute songs. B. JONI MITCHELL: "The Hissing of Suminer Lawns" (Asylum):: The transition from great sohgwriter to bad poet is always a difficult one, and Mitchell's talent and good sense are putting up a fight. But any record that is more interesting to read than to listen to has got to be in a lot of trouble. Of course, interesting is a relative concept, so it must be remembered that Joni's biggest trouble is her current bunch of boyfriends, Tom Scott's El Lay pseudojazz coolcats — when Steely Dcin needs a classy sax break, Phil Woods joins the session, whil^ Mitchell resorts to Bud Shank, the creative paragon who -vaunted his distaste for the boho dance with a hit version of "Michelle." Read 'against such music, the editorials in Cash Box would probably be good for a few kicks, and Mitchell's level of literacy is much higher than that; she's turning into an autodidactic West Coast Erica Jong. Representative couplet from "The Jungle Line," about the pervasiveness of African culture: "Floating, drifting on air-conditioned wind/ Drooling for a taste of something smuggled in," That's not awful. But somebody should convince the artist that her pejoratives apply very well to El Lay coolcats, including floating poetasters who are losing their grasp on music.

IS Minus.

ANN PEEBLES: 'Tellin' It" (Hi) :: Peebles's small, rough-cut ruby of a voice can't buy her Aretha's kind of time; her hesitant pursuit of a dramatic frame, an artistic self, will never do the duty of a real persona. Which may mean that Willie Mitchell is wrong for her. Not only does his seamless funk deprive her of the sharply accentuated settings her voice was created for, but his concentration on music to the exclusion of image leaves her singing warmed-over Millie Jackson wife-andother-women lyrics with the wan Confusion they deserve. B Minus.

ROXY MUSIC: "Siren" (Atco) :: Good album — a lot of fast ones and a great hook. Of course, Roxy Music albums always have hooks — one cut that brings you back to a side again and' again — but "Street Life" and "Virginia Plain" never told us as much about •Roxy's less accessible music as "Love Is the Drug," an equation which represents not liberation from artificial stimulants but the breakdown of both sexual and romantic abandon into "ju$t another high." Very appropriate to situate the song in a singles bar, for that '70s reality is the exemplary environment for Bryan Ferry's romantic pessimism. Much of what his music has to !say about such environments is fascinating, even perversely attractive — but ultimately a little off-putting, which I guess is finally the point. A Minus.

GIL SCOTT-HERON AND BRIAN JACKSON: "From South Africa to South Carolina" (Arista) :: This is what happened to Pharoah Sanders and I say yeah. The demons > strated danceability of Jackson's music reifies the tribal aspirations of newthing avant-gardism just as ScottHeron's modest but fetching talent for analysis brings# all that cosmic politicking down to earth. Also, I really like Scott-Heron's singing — his instrument .will never equal Leon Thomas's, or Pharoah's, but that's not what it's about. BPlus.

THE STAPLE SINGERS: "Let's Do It Again" (Curtom):: If you want to buy an albqm just to own Mavis gasping-like she does on the radio, it's your money. Be hereby informed, however, that the 45 version is 1:24 ugly seconds skinnier than the 33. Other statistics: producer-composer Curtis Mayfield im eluded a total of about 10 miqutes of instrumentals on the classic /lSuper Fly" and "Claudine" soundtrack albums; this 40-minute (eight-cut) job includes only two real songs plus a lot of doodoo-doo, and the orchestrations — by Richard Tufo (responsible for the waste cut on "Claudine") and Gil Askey rather than Johnny Pate (who did "Super Fly")—are pure mush. D.

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HAPPY & ARTIE TRAUM: "Hard Times in the Country** (Rounder) :: If you're a sucked for folkie nonsense — ramblin' mythopoeia, articulated sentiment, purty tunes — you might as well buy it from real folkies on a real, struggling folkie label. Bonus: "Gambler's Song," Artie's uncharacteristically ironic tale of anomie, which ought to be recorded by somebody who'll get it heard. B Minus.

THE UNDISPUTED TRUTH: "Higher Than High" (Gordy) :: Finally a disco song that imparts new meaning to the term "boogie on down.'? Inspirational Verse, from "Poontang": "People say 1 ought to be ashamed of myself/Because I don't make love like nobody else/You see } was in the war y'all and Lord I got wounded/And when I got home to my wife I got down on my knees and spooned it." * CPlus.

TOM WAITS: "Nighthawks at the DinerM (Asylum) :: When he's trying to evoke the naugahyde swizzle-stick dawn, Waits is so fulltof shit Port-O-San ought to name a model after him. Let's hope he follows the example of poetcum-comedian Loudon Wainwright — this is the first album in history where you skip the song to get to the next intro. CPlus.

NEIL YOUNG: "Zuma" (Reprise) :: Young has violated form so convincingly over the past three years that for me , at l6ast, this return to form took a lot of getting used to. In fact, its neatness and control — relative to Y, not to C S, N, and their epigones — vitiates the sprawling blockbuster cuts, "Cortez the Killer" and "Danger Bird." But the less, ambitious tunes — "Pardon My Heart" is my favorite — are as pretty as the best of "After the Gold Rush," yet rougher. Which is a neat trick.

, A Minus.