do it! by clinic
do it sounds much like every other clinic album. fact. those who might dismiss clinic as one trick ponies are durrbrained dullards. fact. see, what clinic have done is hit upon the mystic key, the magic chord, the zen note. what they do do and have done done is discovered a trick so brainboggling astonishing and a pony so bewitchingly strokeable that none of these criticisms apply. we’ve all accepted this fact and moved on. why can’t you, mr haircut sneering in the corner to whatever fleeting ephemera you discovered this morning on myspace, loved by lunchtime, became disinterested by din-dins and now openly loathe on yr fancydan flash based internet installation the very same evening? i used to think the nme was irritatingly fickle and pointlessly scratchyeyed bitchy but you internet kids are squatting and fidgeting endlessly atop this everchangng ten second pile.
so those masked bastards are back (not to be confused with these masked bastards who’ll make an appearance later this week, check back). for thirty three minutes and one lonely second anyway. foisting their organs, motown records, krautrock meets cramps percussion and dubby surfy garagey guitary rock into our eager ears.
the songs of clinic have the eerie, unsettling, mad beauty of an unloved balloon falling high into the sky, string and ribbon trailingtwirling desperately towards the cold earth, lifting ever higher knowing that only an almost sexual exquisite doom awaits. or is that just me….
well the blurb describes it thus: a summer album, a warped technicolor celebration. pop music and severe cut-ups going from melody to acid psychosis to acoustic, usually in the same song.
that’ll do pig, that’ll do.
memories kicks things off with a fuzzy guitar, clubfooted drum stomp, mingling with braindamaged brian wilson harmonies while ennio morricone whoos and whrrrrs in the background. ade blackburn still murmurs and croons and moans as if he’s constantly on the verge of something – tears, laughter, orgasm, psychosis, unconsciousness….
free not free (is actually free with a whole load more b-sides, downloads and video content when you register at the clinic site here) and its belly full of glee is a schizo beast, flitting between dreamy trebly ballad strumming and dirty riffing. if hawaii and detroit had a bastard musical baby it’d be this track.
before you know it twenty seven and a bit minutes have passed and the final tracks playing. coda. it’s chugging organ, oscillating drone noises and oooh ooohs then a bit of fuzzy guitar solo. maybe some bells. in fact definitely bells. church bells. and lots of the bloody things.
i realise i’ve missed out pretty much most of the album so here it is in bits:
brittle blues, psychedelia (not the lame mika shit), boogie, swampy rockabilly, eerie croon, foghorns, snarling garage rock, rhythm melody noise (my three favourite things), familiarity but not contempt, jive and jazz, tension and release, whispers and acid sneers, the fall and duane eddie, satanic alchemy, olde england, witchy voodoo, carnies, fairgrounds and freaks, mucho melodica and an ear for twisted pop, the velvet underground and screamin jay hawkins, grammy nominations and a spectorish penchant, fear and maracas and masks masks masks.
it’s like the voodoo soundtrack to the best russ myer exploitation film you never saw starring tura satana and a young marlon brando making sex with motorcycle chains.
and if that don’t make sense to you….
clinic are filled with the joyful unease of being licked by a cow.
possibly the best line i’ve ever written. fact.
the witch (made to measure):
band / label / previewpurchase
