From r stanton Sent Tue, Sep 4th 2001, 18:37
From r stanton Sent Tue, Sep 4th 2001, 18:37
Here's a review of the new Pub album...this and reviews of new releases by
Sense, V/VM, The Conet Project, and more are at
http://www.students.uiuc.edu/~rstanton
Pub
Do You Ever Regret Pantomime?
(Ampoule Records)
[6.2]
Every Sunday for the first seventeen years of my life, my
half-conscious body was ritualistically dragged out of bed, stuffed into
well-pressed clothes, thrown in a car and carted off to church. Every week
it went the same way. Dad slept, Mom (who was of a different domination that
my father) picked out little snippets of prayer her faction disagreed with
and nudged me whenever they poked their ugly heads, and I just sat there…
Too tired for the analytical approach my mother took, yet too jarred by the
recent rude-awakening to take my fathers route, I sat there, pressed against
the hard wooden pew, in a sort of limbo. Half-awake, bored as hell, my mind
twisting its way around half-developed abstractions for an hour plus each
Sunday morning.
It was 20 minutes into an exceptionally long sermon when I first began
to consider the concept of eternity. It occurred to me on a Sunday morning,
probably around age ten, as the Irish-Catholic priest droned mercilessly on,
that the Eternity In Heaven promised by the church to all “true-believers”
would no doubt be exceptionally boring. I sat there that Sunday morning,
eyes fixed on the absurdly calm face of a crucified wooden Jesus, and for
the first time I began to question this religion business. Try though I
might, I couldn’t fit together the heaven thing. How could there be such a
thing as eternal happiness? For if one never felt anything but happy, how
would one know what happy is? And wouldn’t anything, no matter, how
beautiful and peaceful and awe-inspiring start to grate on one’s patience
after a few millennia of awe and beauty?
Now, on a Sunday morning years later, I sit half-awake in a moderately
comfortable office chair in my living room, clothes the same as the night
before, giving off that unique dried-sweat and stale cigarette smell that’s
synonymous with punk rock. And as I listen to Pub’s Do You Ever Regret
Pantomime? I find myself facing these same immortal questions once again.
Pub is fucking beautiful. Simply put. No denying it. Understated and
subtle, Pub washes quiet beats in a sea of mellow synth swells and organ
loops. Eminently aware of the importance of restraint, Pub’s beats come in
only at key moments, and retreating into hiding when not required. Do You
Ever Regret Pantomime? is at times reminiscent of Aphex Twin’s Selected
Ambient Works II and Fripp and Eno’s No Pussyfooting, with one key
exception. Years later, Selected Ambient Works II and No Pussyfooting are
still undeniably amazing pieces of work. The lush complexities of these
classics will guarantee them a spot in our musical lexicon for years to
come. On the other hand, after two weeks of listening to Pub, I’m more than
ready to move on.
Undeniably beautiful though it may be, Pub is also unapologetically
long-winded. And just like an eternity of angels perched on clouds playing
harpsichord, beautiful or not, Pub gets tiresome after a while. This is
particularly true of Pub’s longer tracks. "Paper Aeroplane" would be a nice
enough ambient house track if it stopped somewhere before the 12 minute
mark, instead it’s a remarkable test of one’s patience. Don’t get me wrong.
Long songs can be wonderful. They’re just not really Pub’s specialty.
Shorter cuts like the strongly Aphex-influenced “Dilemma” prove that this
Scottish duo works best with a smaller canvas.
There’s a Siren-like charm to Pub, pretty and repetitive enough to pull
you in, but be warned, once you start, you will be lulled into a lifetime of
sitting on the couch and listening. It’s obvious that to lull the listener
is the intended effect. But Pub goes about it all wrong. Their music is
captivating, but in the same way that a late night TV commercial is. It saps
your energy, removing your ability to get up and change the CD (or the
channel), or to do much of anything else. Soon, you find yourself listening
to this album all the way through, not really enjoying it, just soaking it
up ‘cause it’s there, James Orin Incandenza’s Infinite Jest on a CD.
As it is, Pub is too concerned with being beautiful and serene for it’s
own good. Ultimately, it needs a little something more. Short tracks like
“Luddite”, an auditory collage of gongs and clocktower bells, or “Heavy
Metal (Hand Over Fist)”, which begins with what sounds like a digeridoo and
manipulated the repeating sound, washing it in layers of synth strings until
it is unrecognizable, stand out as a result of the unique sounds
incorporated. Most of the time, Pub is music that relegates itself to the
background, but these rare noises hidden within make one’s ears perk up and
pay attention. Had Pub been less concerned with serenity, and added a little
more auditory seasoning to the recipe, this album would stand out.
In many ways, Do You Ever Regret Pantomime? is the same Heaven I
imagined so many years ago, my thin little body slumped against the hard
wooden pew. Both are gorgeous, but too lacking in substance to be the sort
of place you want to spend an eternity. Pub walks a fine line between
serenity and monotony, spending fair amounts of time in each camp. In the
end Pub proves that no amount of beauty is enough, if nothing ever changes.
David M. Pecoraro
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