PiL - The Flowers of Romance
I borrowed this rather unique album from the collection of the Missus a while back and as much of a Public Image Limited fan as I am, I still feel totally different about it each time I listen to it.
For a band that created a string of early albums that were disparate in tone and approach, this one stands apart even from that. It is so stark and almost avant-gard in so many odd spots. Keith Levene, whose guitar mayhem I took a liking to, is almost doing a kind of tribal musique concrete thing over the pounding drums of Martin Atkins. There is some guitar synth bits that swell up and then seem to decay off into nowhere, with a cinematic chaos to all of it. It is post-punk meets Stockhausen. There are areas where you can definitely tell how Levene influenced other players like the Edge and Charlie Burchill with use of space and quirky atmospherics.
Lydon doesn't seem to sing half the time as much as proclaim. OK, he was always somewhat like that, even during his Sex Pistols days, but on this album it is even more prevalent and disjoint. Even the more straightahead cuts, such as Banging the Door are still teeming with an almost martial cadence that threatens your ears with ready-to-disintegrate tension.
PiL were one of the major architects of post-punk, but I would not rely on this album as the intro (go for Metal Box for the early period, 9 for the later material, which is both artier and more accessible).
For a band that created a string of early albums that were disparate in tone and approach, this one stands apart even from that. It is so stark and almost avant-gard in so many odd spots. Keith Levene, whose guitar mayhem I took a liking to, is almost doing a kind of tribal musique concrete thing over the pounding drums of Martin Atkins. There is some guitar synth bits that swell up and then seem to decay off into nowhere, with a cinematic chaos to all of it. It is post-punk meets Stockhausen. There are areas where you can definitely tell how Levene influenced other players like the Edge and Charlie Burchill with use of space and quirky atmospherics.
Lydon doesn't seem to sing half the time as much as proclaim. OK, he was always somewhat like that, even during his Sex Pistols days, but on this album it is even more prevalent and disjoint. Even the more straightahead cuts, such as Banging the Door are still teeming with an almost martial cadence that threatens your ears with ready-to-disintegrate tension.
PiL were one of the major architects of post-punk, but I would not rely on this album as the intro (go for Metal Box for the early period, 9 for the later material, which is both artier and more accessible).
posted by theloniusfunk at 2:47 AM
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