Has Jakob been reading Rob Bell? What kind of country do you want to live in? One that overcomes? Seems pertinent in the run-up to a Presidential election. What would make you H.A.P.P.Y.? Are the Wallflowers coming over all Pollyanna?
The title Glad All Over carries an inevitable nod to 60’s Brit-pop, being the title of the Dave Clark Five song which had them achieving US success on the heels of the Beatles. Slicer, who’s much too young to remember DC5’s success, associates the song with punk band The Rezillos. The Clash’s Mick Jones, who guests on this album, would be well acquainted them. (Slicer far prefers the up-beat Rezillos version over the tame and twee original – and the reminder is likely to prompt a post on the Rezillos soon).
New Wave sympathies of Jakob and his bandmates aren't a surprise. Consider the similarity between the cover of their 2002 album Red Letter Days
and Blondie's debut.
Probably just co-incidence - black clothes and strongly backlit, and the common ground in album titles (Blondie's next was Plastic Letters).
Enough of the speculation…. back to the album in hand…
The opening track, Hospital for Sinners, hits like a juggernaut. Organ that sounds like Hammond thru a Fuzz pedal, plus Tremolo, and grungy guitar. What finally emerges from the mix is a syncopated riff reminiscent of T-Rex’s Telegram Sam (even Slicer's 14yr old son made the connection), or a slower version of Dr Feelgood’s She Does it Right.
The place described in the song comes in a variety of forms:
“Some have crosses, bells that ring
Most have angels, painted with wings”
They’re characterized by resilience in adversity:
“They outlast the setbacks of earthquakes and plagues
They burn them like haystacks and another one is raised.”
In fact they’re a refuge, as evidenced by “bums on the steps” and “a baby in a basket being left” (a notion whose connotations could hardly go unnoticed by the Jewish lead singer/songwriter, whose Lawgiver had a similar start in life – what’s interesting here is the basket not being left among bulrushes, but in a post-Hebrew setting. How much influence has his father's spiritual journey had on him? - some valuable insights here).
“It’ll shelter a poor man, it’ll humble a great,” it’s a place where derelicts and outlaws can find sanctuary; but, more than that, “The worst hearts you’ve known can be salvaged and saved.” Sweet idea, but they can’t mean the likes of Ian Huntley, or Jimmy Savile… can they?
According the song, they’re all over the place – “more than a few on nearly every map.” You should be able to recognize them easily:
“You’ll see one before you with wide open gates
It’s a hospital for sinners, ain’t no museum of saints.”
If only it was so for more of them!
There’s none of Belinda Carlisle’s cheese when Jakob sings playfully
“It’s a good place to shuffle when you’ve been thru the deck
It’s the closest to heaven on earth you can get.”
Loiter, shuffle, hang around “if it’s a comeback you want.” In the meantime, churches take note of the foundation on which this song stands – the model, the blueprint – “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick,” or even “Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven.” As Dr John put it, “Life is a near-death experience.”
Misfits and Lovers. This one has the unmistakable sound of Mick Jones’ influence, and presence, yet it sounds jolly with handclaps and gently overdriven guitar. Jones shares Dylan’s Russian Jewish ancestry, with its history of exile and a people apart. (Rami Jaffee on keyboards & Greg Richling on bass are also Jewish). The song continues the theme of shelter for misfits and outsiders, as well as for lovers, hiding either from the elements or from public gaze under the overpass:
“This overpass wasn’t made for going down south
For them coming in or us going out
It’s a temple of concrete that sits
With losers and orphans under it
Full of misfits and lovers who just need the cover that it gives…”
It’s Springsteen-like, both melodically and lyrically (“you can hide ‘neath your covers…”), but is not so indebted that it doesn’t stand in its own right.
First One in the Car is suggestive of some “back seat action,” and juxtaposes “the topless bars and the church.” The song seems to be a kind of benediction, a desire for the good of each other, which acknowledges the appeal of temptation but calls for supernatural protection.
“As we roll from the city under the stars
On down the boulevard
May God be the first one in the car
May He be the last one out of ours.”
You can see Jakob wish that blessing on a girl in the crowd in the intro to the song at this gig.
Reboot the Mission is underpinned by a pulsing bass, and has clear Clash influences yet has Jakob sounding vocally surprisingly like Chris Rea. There's piano on the off-beat. The final verse suggests that the band have re-booted - introducing Jack Irons the new drummer, and name-checking The Clash's Joe Strummer to demonstrate Jack's credibility. (He played with the late Joe Strummer in a post-Clash band, but has other strong lines on his CV too, including Red Hot Chili Peppers and Pearl Jam).
or if you'd prefer a live version, there's a great performance on Letterman:
The song urges that the listener has lost their way, bitten off more than they can chew. It suggests the need for a restart. The singer states he can’t see clearly but he still has vision, and exhorts that we keep our “eyes on the prize.” Not an original idiom, but then Jakob’s dad borrowed heavily from the same writer (in fact from the first half of the same sentence!) ...and the author this particular phrase is attributed to did lose his sight temporarily and helped reboot the mission… OK, Slicer may be over-egging it - maybe it's just about a band getting back together and paying tribute to an early influence (apparently Jakob was taken to a Clash gig when he was 12 - around Bar Mitzvah age - and there was that highly revealing interview in the New York Times in 2005).
Maybe Jakob and Co just liked the rhyme ;-)
“Eyes on the prize, reboot the mission
I lost my sight, but not the vision.”
It’s a Dream seems to Slicer to relate to the need to struggle on in life, to not get caught sleeping on the job, to play our part. The pounding snare throughout stirs up images of hard labour, or a factory line, in Slicer’s imagination. The song has some elements that seem real, some surreal:
“It’s a whale, it’s a whale where the valley once was…
… I can hear I can hear chanting in the woods
On their hind legs walking on their little swine hooves
Singing Hi Ho Silver…”
It’s tricky, however, to separate what’s dreaming from what’s wakefulness.
“Love is a country better crossed when you’re young…
Love is a country better served with someone…
Love is a country that won’t be overcome….”
Apart from that, Slicer hasn’t a clue what this one’s about (and maybe he's at sea on the others too!) – but he likes the sound of the 3rd country more than the 1st.
Chimey sound, with a tight rhythm reminiscent of the vibe inside a train as it “barrels down the tracks.” The guitar feedback which closes the song (on the album as opposed to in the vid) could even be its whistle.
Have Mercy on Him Now
“Have some faith, pass it down
Let him know the way back is easily found
When he’s ready, he’ll come around…”
How very Prodigal Son.
It continues to describe the difficulty of a father watching his son make the mistakes he needs to make to “cut his own teeth.” It calls for a looser leash and
“Anyway, anyhow
Have mercy on him now.”
The Devil’s Waltz. Yet more religious imagery.
“Need a busload of faith and a healer’s touch
A whole lot of feel to know the work from luck.”
What work is being referred to here? Is it healing work? Is the ‘feel’ a discernment between apparent faith-healing and luck? Or is the work the jobs that are lacking for all but the lucky:
“The future’s wide open just not wide enough
It ain’t any wonder these kids are still getting drunk.”
“There’s more than just bottles getting washed up on the rocks.”
The singer has strong words for those who merely offer pity and don’t contribute to alleviating the problem:
“And your idle hands are what he wants
Your songs of pity are the Devil’s Waltz…”
It Won’t Be Long (Till We’re Not Wrong Any More). This song yearns for the time to come soon when we understand things correctly, or when we’re ‘in the right.’ It reminds Slicer of the cry “How Long?” (picked up by U2 in “40”). Or perhaps the cry from the back seat “Are we there yet?”
“The message it has been sent
There’s no more roses on this vine
I’ve given you everything you’ve got
And a little more than a sign.”
Constellation Blues
“You can tell a few things about the soul of a town
From the blood of the men gone in the ground…
…First I saw blood was in a soldier’s hair
Dryin’ to his forehead in the desert air”
Not too much left to the imagination there. I doubt Jakob and his mates will be voting for Romney…
There’s a sense of generational guilt and shared consequences
“There’s something in the water we’ve been passing around
We’ve eaten the berries there is no doubt
Like our father before us…
The angels that used to be guarding our beds
Have all wandered off and left us instead.”
One Set of Wings sounds like he’s trying to land a plane, or is he an angel trying to earn a pair? Whatever, one verse would’ve fitted Felix’s skydive this week:
“From where you are it must seem crazy
This weaving in and out of clouds
It’s not an airstrike believe me
I am only trying to get this thing down...
...And one set of wings just will not be enough.”
Mr Baumgartner, got any Red Bull left?
A great album - welcome back, the band. "If it's a comeback you want," this rates as one.
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