Label: Cherry Red UK
Category: Music
Average customer rating:
Media: Audio CD
Number Of Discs: 1
EAN: 5013929115828
ASIN: B0000256LG
Release Date: 2004-04-01
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Artist: Momus
Label: Cherry Red UK Category: Music Average customer rating:
Media: Audio CD Number Of Discs: 1 EAN: 5013929115828 ASIN: B0000256LG Release Date: 2004-04-01 |
Ping Pong
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In this era of easy access even to inaccessible things, it's hard to believe something so worthy of notice could slip beneath our cultural radar for so long. Yet Nick Currie, a Scottish pop aesthete who's been steadily releASINg records as Momus for more than a decade, has so far managed to evade stateside detection. Late 1997 brought his first-ever U.S. release, including a compilation and a brand-new studio album, <I>Ping Pong</I>, poising Momus to advance from utter obscurity to a more comfortably hip position--perhaps beside Currie's hero Serge Gainsbourg or his friends Pizzicato 5 in the near-underground of pop culture.<P> <I>Ping Pong</I>, with its opening theme invoking "futuristic vaudevillians," is full of dark humor, showmanship, and sophisticated cultural critiques. Songs explore fame and privacy, relish infanticide and celebrate youth, conduct a dialogue with God and express absurdly philo-Semitic views. Like all the best songwriters, Currie is in complete control of his craft. He can write in character, or in the voice of his female vocalists, and his own recordings--richly arranged but somewhat crude with drum machines and synths--suggest the possibilities for further interpretations. With songs like "Anthem of Shibuya" and "Lolitapop Dollhouse," Currie seems to cater to his largest audience, the Japanese. It's not a sellout but, rather, a further indication of his skill. In pop, giving people what they want is, after all, the art itself. <I>--Roni Sarig</I>Customer Reviews:
as long as you are morally good in your acts.......2002-03-13
The music of Ping Pong however, is pure Casio-pop. He records on a hard disk alone, making all the music on his keyboard and a guitar. It's all very Casio-like and Momus throws in some old video game sounds and some harpsicords (an indicator of his next album's direction) for good measure. The sound is very easy to listen to, but it's the intelligence, almost up-right pretenciousness, content, and sheer length of some songs that would keep them from being played on the radio. It's pop taken to some extremes. Same goes for the lyrics. He indulges in some desires and brings them to the next level.
As I said, the lyrics are very far out there, but luckily, Momus likes keeping it all in good fun. For example, the second track, "His Majesty The Baby," is about how babies are treated by women. It's like they're kings.... The fact that he rhymes the words "despot" and "taspot" does little to get in the way. The point is made. Once you get past the near word game trickiness of "I Want You But I Don't Need You" it all makes perfect sense. ("I want you, and I want you to want me to want you / But I don't need you / don't need you to need me to need you.")
"Shoesize of the Angel" is the reversal of an earlier Momus song, "Hairstyle of the Devil," which he admits was a calculated attempt at something radio-friendly, maybe making him a one hit wonder. The idea of the original was that there's a girl you want to get with, but she has a guy already, and it's about this mysterious man's unknown charisma. "Shoesize of the Angel" isn't just the reversal of the idea, that you know the guy is a jerk, but the actual melodies of the original are played backwards. So the comment about it having the bassline from "Rapper's Delight" is completely false. It's just the bassline from the earlier song reversed. "The Age of Information" deals with the loss of privacy that will occur in the future when technology puts all of your history out there. Instead of going to crazy measures to insure that everyone's personal lives remain private, the song reccomends that you act morally good so that you won't be afraid of what people will find out about you. Also, the music in this song is taken to the Casio's ethereal max.
"Space Jews," although played completely straight-faced, is the weirdest song of the pack. The theory is that Jews are a superhuman race of beings that came from outer space a long time ago. They were sent to improve the human race. That's why they win all the Nobel Prizes... apparently. "My Kindly Friend The Censor" is a witty love song with all the dirty words taken out by the censor. ("I begin to (tabboo verb) you / As you gaze back with a smile / Which almost triggers my (word missing) / But don't (unacceptable)") It's a riot.
Momus is the God of Merriment.......2000-02-03
The feast is full and varied, as always........1999-07-31
Brilliant!.......1999-07-10
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