Hood
Cold House
[Aesthetics; 2001]
Rating: 8.5
Remember when MTV was still that little renegade music channel? I vividly
recall sitting in front of the TV when I was a kid, entranced for hours by
Twisted Sister, Def Leppard, and Quiet Riot videos. And though I wasn't entirely
sure about what was going on in front of my eyes, I was fascinated all the same.
To think that there were places where grown men ran around in make-up and spandex
and still managed to kick total rock ass. These were guys that acted completely
insane, yet took themselves seriously and were fawned over by women everywhere.
As a child, it was like a portal into a strange parallel universe where all of
my small town values were inverted.
Then there was the other breed of MTV musician: synth-pop guys who seemed more
like real artist types and didn't seem to be concerned as much with making a
fantastic testosterone-soaked spectacle of themselves as creating seductive and
melodic music. Naked Eyes, Human League, Talk Talk-- they seemed so cutting
edge with their Roland synths and electronic drumpads, and the sounds they
created were something entirely new, at least to popular music (sorry, I wasn't
listening to Brian Eno and Kraftwerk when I was 10).
This was the type of stuff that really interested me. But somewhere along the
line, synth-pop began its long estrangement from melody, and electronica began
to take over. It started innocuously enough, but soon began incorporating more
beat manipulation and studio effects until it was finally twisted into the form
known today as IDM. I miss those early days when the technology didn't rule the
product, and I think it's time we saw some songwriters doing a little taking
back. It's time for a rebirth of synth-pop, wherein all the new innovations in
electronic music are employed in the service of melody.
As my posterchild for this movement, I select Hood. (I also accept donations.)
Cold House takes a fantastic batch of songs and intelligently mixes in
cutting edge electronic elements a la Autechre and Nobukazu Takemura, a couple
of west coast underground hip-hop artists, and some delicate backing arrangements,
and creates one of the most innovative releases of the past year.
The biggest surprise on Cold House is the guest spots by Anticon MCs
Dose-One and Why?. I'm not sure how Hood hooked up with the San Francisco
rappers, but their inclusion here was a brilliant decision. The duo's scat
lyrics and drum-n-bass delivery really temper the album, preventing it from
becoming too soft at points. Chris Hood's lead vocals aren't very inspiring,
falling limply somewhere between Badly Drawn Boy and Bernard Sumner, but by
mixing in the slit cut vocals, spoken word and psychobabble riffing, a perfect
contrast is created between the them.
The album opens promisingly with "They Removed All Trace That Anything Had
Happened Here," a nice mix of delicate start/stop clicks, jangly guitar and
tasteful cello arrangements. The song splits the vocal sections, starting first
with Chris Hood and then handing everything over to Dose-One, who drones over a
repeated vocal loop whose compelling nature lies in its unintelligibility. "You
Show No Emotion at All" kicks off with an unimaginative scratchy beat, but soon
picks up with nice trumpet and keyboard fills, revealing itself as the strongest
track on the album that strictly features Hood's own vocals.
"With Branches Bare"
thrives on a distended drone that sounds clipped straight from Depeche Mode's
Violator. Halfway through, Dose-One hops in with his nasal tone and
surreal lyrics: "We spit in the pond to give the fish something to pray to/
Sometimes the sunset doesn't want to be photographed/ We are no tigers in the
picked-bone grasslands." But the album's standout comes with the closing track,
"You're Worth the Whole World." It's sung entirely by Dose-One over a low-mixed
spoken track, a simple picked guitar progression, and hushed horn keyboards that
lead in from the melancholy preceding track, "Lines Low to a Frozen Ground."
There are some misses in the middle of the album, like "The River Curls Around
This Town," a track that, while never really amounting to much, does end with
some nice, richly atmospheric electronic gamelan sounds. Indeed, all of the
tracks on Cold House-- even the weaker ones-- contribute something of
interest. Take, for instance, "I Can't Find My Brittle Youth," which might
amount to little more than filler if not for the machine gun drumming that comes
out of nowhere and closes the track like John Bonham at 78rpm.
Since their inception in 1994, Hood haven't been able to make up their minds
what kind of band they want to be. Over the course of their past four albums
(not to mention their countless singles, EPs, compilation appearances, remix
records, and collections), they've jumped indecisively from genre to genre,
experimenting with shoegazer, straightforward indie rock, slowcore, and lo-fi.
But with Cold House, Hood seem to have finally stumbled into a sound all
their own, melding their countless influences into something totally unique and,
at last, giving music fanatics and critics worldwide a reason to look forward
to their future releases. Let's hope the payoff is this good next time around.
-Nathan Rooney, January 10th, 2002