sitting in my favourite berlin pub (with the crystal set's benefit of the doubt playin nicely in the background), i feel like writing some lines about one
of my favourite albums - the one i'd call marty's greatest solo effort - all about eve's "ultraviolet".
first - i like how that album was totally out of time with everything else. it was too hard for the dream poppers, too elaborate and rock for the shoegazers, too nice for flannel flying grunge people, fans of the first AAE albums turned away in disgust. 1992. i loved it! those who loved to listen to 50 minutes of great individual guitar work should have been excited. this could have been the start of a journey into an unexplored guitar bliss realm. in hindsight, it was the end.
i love almost everything about "ultraviolet". it is sooo marty; he's the center of that record's universe. julianne regan's vocal deliveries are barely noticeable, she restricts herself to a thin, multilayered choir without changing the timbre too much. what remains is a dam tight rhythm section and MWP at his best, as we know him, playing every note with almost exaggerated intensity, freewheeling, freaking out, strumming, jangling, wailing, flageoletting, feedbacking, singing, soaring, exploding...he's singing through his guitar and telling everything noone will be ever capable with the human voice (he doesnt provide a single vocal note in the background). this is the marty of the P=A period, creating landscapes of the most various kinds, a magician who just discovered the wide field a guitar can be. this album and P=A beamed marty next to hendrix in my private universe, with hendrix being the ulysses (great achievements, but rarely consumed) and marty being someone like milan kundera... here, marty continues the textured blessings of gems like "lustre" and "chaos". many of the songs feature free-form feedback...but there's more music in marty's feedback than most other bands will ever produce in their SONGS!
1) phased
there are few brush strokes of synth magic on "ultraviolet", most of it is created with the guitar. it starts with a "lunar siren"....the first stroke on the rickenbacker tell you where the journey going to go. deep, resonating rick...intoxicating groove and beautiful choirs by julianne. what the hell is she singing about? during the ultraviolet sessions she must have found a textbook about physics...i mean "crystallize", "phased", "infrared", "ultraviolet", "event horizon", "gravity", "freeze", "chemicals"..."ultraviolet"'s lyrics consist mostly of physical/chemical metaphors. this is a classic opener, huge, epic sweeps, clearing the road for....
2) yesterday goodbye
one of the few pop songs. i'd call it hard psycho pop. the first chords have to be heard to be believed. dense, almost garage-ey, before a soaring chorus kidnaps us into a lennon universe. a miniature, but like a neutrone star, very very dense.
3) mine
weird, mid-tempo magic. i never really understood this. surreal track.
4) freeze
did you read dave fricke's review of AENT? "chromium" is like "icy rain". this here is frozen nitrogene. the temperature drops when you listen to this. i always wondered if the words "love you for your beauty, love you for the books you read" were targeted to marty. i mean, someone putting his library on the sleeve of a record...
5) things he told her
another killer. vaguely sixties beat, overbuilt with deep P=A-magic. a larva of chromium, and a very disturbing one.
6) infrared
i adore this for its structure. the verses doesn't attract particular attention, then a "bridge" begins - and dissipates into a wonderful being of its own. major shift, huge choir, voices from everywhere, slashing morricone notes from MWP...no refrain at all....just a huge crescendo and an afterglow. stellar.
7) i don't know
this one touches me even more than the rest. the only one to be easily compared. it takes the place "Feel" occupies on P=A - a slightly out-of-context track with a gentle dancing beat, almost happy. imagine "feel" meets the beatles' "she said she said" meets "it's all too much" meets "kings" meets "across the universe", but much more beautiful. this one is the one beaming you back to the end of your childhood when you were probably interested in late hippie stuff, incense, ndark clothes, without being "goth" or stuff... it transcends a special kind of innocence you might have almost forgotten. when books started to mean something. when records started to be loved, not liked. pseudo indian tabla beat, one-chord-magic, pseudo-mantra singing - and then a chorus that should make you cry of happiness, with a gentle rickenbacker in the middle of all that beauty.
![<img src=]()
" src="http://www.ezboard.com/images/emoticons/glasses.gif"> dream butcher
fuck! the only useless song. a dumb fake horror piece. UV wuld have been better if some finer day would have been placed after i don't know. weak song full of cliches and devoid of all magick.
9) some finer day
now that's what i call a pop song. the only one on UV, actually. clocking in below 3 minutes, this is the essence of 30 years of jangle pop. it's a tiny diamond - no synths, no frills, two riffs, to "l", one hyphen and no bullshit. doesnt need hyper-multi-layered vocals. will work at any campfire, in any cast - one of those Great Eternal Songs.
10) blindfolded visionary
maybe the darkest piece of the whole record, a mid tempo burner that will drag you into a dark green sea of melancholy and ringing guitars. maybe the most churchy track on this one. would have been great on P=A
11) outshine the sun
a true finale. 9 minutes and marty's longest-ever guitar solo apart from bastard universe/jammed. a great song in its own way, too. think "grind" from a female POV. on 5:02, marty begins a looong solo, free, intense, jammed and grandiose...some of us have experienced this at the end of a show, when he transforms into a receiver/transmitter of sonic wildness. stresses that UV is actually HIS record. every young guitarist should write it down, and he would have enough improvisational skills for at least some years. MWP outshining himself.
i LOVE that record
first - i like how that album was totally out of time with everything else. it was too hard for the dream poppers, too elaborate and rock for the shoegazers, too nice for flannel flying grunge people, fans of the first AAE albums turned away in disgust. 1992. i loved it! those who loved to listen to 50 minutes of great individual guitar work should have been excited. this could have been the start of a journey into an unexplored guitar bliss realm. in hindsight, it was the end.
i love almost everything about "ultraviolet". it is sooo marty; he's the center of that record's universe. julianne regan's vocal deliveries are barely noticeable, she restricts herself to a thin, multilayered choir without changing the timbre too much. what remains is a dam tight rhythm section and MWP at his best, as we know him, playing every note with almost exaggerated intensity, freewheeling, freaking out, strumming, jangling, wailing, flageoletting, feedbacking, singing, soaring, exploding...he's singing through his guitar and telling everything noone will be ever capable with the human voice (he doesnt provide a single vocal note in the background). this is the marty of the P=A period, creating landscapes of the most various kinds, a magician who just discovered the wide field a guitar can be. this album and P=A beamed marty next to hendrix in my private universe, with hendrix being the ulysses (great achievements, but rarely consumed) and marty being someone like milan kundera... here, marty continues the textured blessings of gems like "lustre" and "chaos". many of the songs feature free-form feedback...but there's more music in marty's feedback than most other bands will ever produce in their SONGS!
1) phased
there are few brush strokes of synth magic on "ultraviolet", most of it is created with the guitar. it starts with a "lunar siren"....the first stroke on the rickenbacker tell you where the journey going to go. deep, resonating rick...intoxicating groove and beautiful choirs by julianne. what the hell is she singing about? during the ultraviolet sessions she must have found a textbook about physics...i mean "crystallize", "phased", "infrared", "ultraviolet", "event horizon", "gravity", "freeze", "chemicals"..."ultraviolet"'s lyrics consist mostly of physical/chemical metaphors. this is a classic opener, huge, epic sweeps, clearing the road for....
2) yesterday goodbye
one of the few pop songs. i'd call it hard psycho pop. the first chords have to be heard to be believed. dense, almost garage-ey, before a soaring chorus kidnaps us into a lennon universe. a miniature, but like a neutrone star, very very dense.
3) mine
weird, mid-tempo magic. i never really understood this. surreal track.
4) freeze
did you read dave fricke's review of AENT? "chromium" is like "icy rain". this here is frozen nitrogene. the temperature drops when you listen to this. i always wondered if the words "love you for your beauty, love you for the books you read" were targeted to marty. i mean, someone putting his library on the sleeve of a record...
5) things he told her
another killer. vaguely sixties beat, overbuilt with deep P=A-magic. a larva of chromium, and a very disturbing one.
6) infrared
i adore this for its structure. the verses doesn't attract particular attention, then a "bridge" begins - and dissipates into a wonderful being of its own. major shift, huge choir, voices from everywhere, slashing morricone notes from MWP...no refrain at all....just a huge crescendo and an afterglow. stellar.
7) i don't know
this one touches me even more than the rest. the only one to be easily compared. it takes the place "Feel" occupies on P=A - a slightly out-of-context track with a gentle dancing beat, almost happy. imagine "feel" meets the beatles' "she said she said" meets "it's all too much" meets "kings" meets "across the universe", but much more beautiful. this one is the one beaming you back to the end of your childhood when you were probably interested in late hippie stuff, incense, ndark clothes, without being "goth" or stuff... it transcends a special kind of innocence you might have almost forgotten. when books started to mean something. when records started to be loved, not liked. pseudo indian tabla beat, one-chord-magic, pseudo-mantra singing - and then a chorus that should make you cry of happiness, with a gentle rickenbacker in the middle of all that beauty.
fuck! the only useless song. a dumb fake horror piece. UV wuld have been better if some finer day would have been placed after i don't know. weak song full of cliches and devoid of all magick.
9) some finer day
now that's what i call a pop song. the only one on UV, actually. clocking in below 3 minutes, this is the essence of 30 years of jangle pop. it's a tiny diamond - no synths, no frills, two riffs, to "l", one hyphen and no bullshit. doesnt need hyper-multi-layered vocals. will work at any campfire, in any cast - one of those Great Eternal Songs.
10) blindfolded visionary
maybe the darkest piece of the whole record, a mid tempo burner that will drag you into a dark green sea of melancholy and ringing guitars. maybe the most churchy track on this one. would have been great on P=A
11) outshine the sun
a true finale. 9 minutes and marty's longest-ever guitar solo apart from bastard universe/jammed. a great song in its own way, too. think "grind" from a female POV. on 5:02, marty begins a looong solo, free, intense, jammed and grandiose...some of us have experienced this at the end of a show, when he transforms into a receiver/transmitter of sonic wildness. stresses that UV is actually HIS record. every young guitarist should write it down, and he would have enough improvisational skills for at least some years. MWP outshining himself.
i LOVE that record
"One more day I may forget my reason"
