April 22-28, 2004

music

CD Reviews

MOODY MUSIC
The Magnetic Fields
i
(NONESUCH)

Built upon a conceit — all the song titles start with the letter “i” — the long-awaited follow-up to The Magnetic Fields’ universally lauded 1999 three-disc colossus, 69 Love Songs, is exactly the sort of disc one might expect in the wake of such a sprawling undertaking. Sharing its name with the first person pronoun, i is an introspective effort, played entirely on hand-held instruments (much of the band’s catalog involves programmed sequences), giving the tracks the feel of 14 epigrams set to chamber music. i puts leader Stephin Merritt’s lyrical dexterity and uncanny grasp of the human psyche front and center. On the psychosis study “I Wish I Had an Evil Twin,” the song’s shrinking-violet protagonist projects his evil impulses onto an imaginary sibling, while “I Don’t Believe You,” a re-recorded version of a 1998 7-inch release chronicles a lying lover who remains irresistible. That i is almost entirely acoustic may put off some fans, but Merritt’s songwriting remains electric. —Brian Howard

Magnetic Fields performs Mon., April 26, $15-$20, Irvine Auditorium, University of Pennsylvania, 34th and Spruce sts., www.musictoday.com.

Der Punk Tanzvergnügen

Liars
They Were Wrong, So We Drowned

Einstürzende Neubauten
Perpetuum Mobile
(MUTE)

My, how the tables have turned. Angus Andrew and his fellow Liars eschewed their signature distorto dance-punk on the new They Were Wrong, So We Drowned, abandoning structure and form in favor of avant-garde dissonance. It follows the lead of vintage work by German industrialists Einstürzende Neubauten, relying on odd textures, sampled sounds and makeshift instruments to create an unsettling ambiance. Spastic rhythms and rock-tumbler noises beat on “Broken Witch” for six minutes. “Hold Hands and It Will Happen Anyway” screeches and squeals to the pattering of what sounds like a plastic pipe. The slower “We Fenced Other Gardens With the Bones of Our Own” employs a steady guitar drone, working towards the chant — sure to become a catch phrase — “Fly, fly/ The devil’s in your eye/ Shoot, shoot.”

While new Liars sounds like old Neubauten, new Neubauten seems to echo old Liars. The title cut on the collective’s 11th album, Perpetuum Mobile, locks into a vicious groove and refuses to let go, much like the young hipsters’ half-hour opus “This Dust Makes That Mud.” The strained iron-plate beats on “Selbstportrait Mit Kater” bring the album to its zenith of danceability, though most moments are markedly more subdued, like the humming eastern bells of “Ein Seltener Vogel” and the smacked-sheet-metal instrumental “Ozean und Brandung.” Even if it’s edgy for just about anybody else, Perpetuum is still tame by Neubauten standards and some may take this as a sign that the noisemakers are running out of steam in their old age. But within the humming air compressor and soft handclaps in “Ich Gehe Jetzt,” there’s still potency, a stirring breathlessness. Maybe after 24 years Neubauten realizes they don’t have to be dissonant to be gripping. Let’s see what Liars are doing in a couple decades. —John Vettese

Hip-hop/memoir

Dilated Peoples
Neighborhood Watch
(CAPITOL)

On their third major label CD, the former Good Life regulars wax nostalgic about post-Black Panther-Brown Beret L.A. during the Reagan years (including a KDAY tribute sketch). But rather than romanticize the crack-crazy narcotics trade, MCs Rakaa and Evidence detail a SoCal childhood filled with choosing wardrobe colors carefully, rushing to get home before dark, getting jacked at the skating rink and just trying to breathe. The lackluster appearance by wunderkind du jour, Kanye West, is a formulaic sore spot on Neighborhood Watch, which for the most part, manages to be gritty, gentle and gifted in all the right places. —Maori Holmes

Dilated Peoples plays the Penn Relays with Kanye West and Young Gunz, Fri., April 23, 8:30 p.m., $25, Electric Factory, Seventh and Willow sts., 215-336-2000.

Choral History

Michel Plasson, Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse
Berlioz: La Révolution Grecque,
Grandes Ouvres Chorales
(EMI CLASSICS)

In an age of grandly eccentric artists, Hector Berlioz was a standout. He was a leading figure of early Romanticism in music, but his voice was inimitable, and is still unique. He certainly does not fit comfortably in the French lineage; with a dynamic range that flows from whispery delicacy to a frenetic roar, he is more of a precursor to the grandiloquence of Wagner and Liszt than the impressionism of Debussy and Ravel. This collection of short choral works, mostly quite obscure, is consistently compelling and very representative of the composer’s intensely theatrical style. Those who only know Berlioz’s best-known work, “Symphonie Fantastique,” will easily recognize this signature. Veteran conductor Michel Plasson nimbly leads his vibrant Toulouse musicians through this delicious material. —Peter Burwasser