| |
 "There's
music that can take you away," Tragically Hip lead singer
Gordon Downie declares on the band's latest album In Violet
Light. Following Music-at-Work, the band's scattered
and unfocused release of 2000, listeners can be forgiven if they
are not exactly sure where it is we are going and if the trip
is even one worth taking. After the release of Downie's stripped
down and poetic solo outing, 2001's Coke Machine Glow,
the future was questionable for the Canadian group and it appeared
that Downie, one of the most under appreciated lyricists working,
might be more inspired and relevant outside of the confines of
the Hip. Luckily, In Violet Light finds the Tragically
Hip as focused and as tight as ever.
It would have been easy for this album to go bad. Songs such
as "Leaves", which centers on a conversation between
a mother bird and a baby bird, aren't exactly your standard rock
fare. Downie is a good enough lyricist to pull it off, though.
What made Downie's solo disk so remarkable was his ability to
write about themes and events in his life that might normally
seem clumsy or awkward in less skilled hands. It is no surprise
then to find how well Downie continues to examine the ideas of
aging, fatherhood, and mortality throughout In Violet Light.
On "Leaves", a bird asks of a bird, "Do you mean
the attack is routine?/In this context, a concave nest, how do
we learn to hurt?" Elsewhere, on "Throwing Off Glass",
he recalls a conversation with his daughter: '"Why is the
world so creepy?' she asked...I told her that it isn't...that
it...that it's exquisite, but like love, it can have its barbarous
threats." On "A Beautiful Thing", a title taken
from the children's story Miss Rumphius, we find Downie
on the receiving end of a late night phone call, cradling a joint,
discussing "things and where they went, big remarkable events
and how each day's a new day and they get spent" before
urging the caller to "try to do one true beautiful thing."
Perhaps the most impressive song, however, is the "Dark
Canuck". "This one is for you and it goes on and on
and on, when nothing seems to do, for when the doubtless and
the wrong ask, 'can I help you?' in that way that says, 'I can't'
or claim we're all the same, just inconsistent." From there,
Downie offers himself as a good connection for drugs, considers
the length of time required to turn doubts into art, declares
that "war isn't for children," and ultimately leaves
us at a drive-in "in the clouds of blood at the end of Jaws,
in the midst of cars honking their applause" asking, "should
we stay for the Dark Canuck? Who's for the Dark Canuck?"
Remarkably, it all makes perfect sense.
Musically, In Violet Light is a marriage of the more
straightforward rock of the band's earlier releases and the moodier,
sparser feel of their later efforts. There is thematic synergy
evident between the arrangements and the lyrics. The Tragically
Hip certainly don't reinvent the wheel or break into any new
sonic territory, but there is a sense of reserve that permeates
even the harder album tracks.
It is probably safe to say that most albums that contain footnotes
with the lyrics are probably going to suck, or at least be terribly
pretentious. And though In Violet Light's lyric sheet
is littered with footnotes to works by the likes of Robert Lowell,
John Gardner, and Raymond Carver, it somehow manages to avoid
pretension, which is remarkable on its own. Add to this a band
at the peak of their talents and a truly inspired lyricist and
you've got an album worth spending your money on.
* www.thehip.com
|
|
