September 2001 • Rockbites Alternative Daily
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September 2001 • Rockbites Alternative Daily
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Black Box Recorder: perfectly ironic & politically incorrect 20 September 2001
In these days of heartbreaking sadness, all music takes on special and different meaning. BBR’s minimalist but emotive pop, which is always hope inspiring, in our new context seems even more so. On 21 August the English trio followed up their hyper-romantic second album, The Facts Of Life, with a comprehensive singles + B-sides + videos collection. Released only in the US, fans in the UK and Europe can pick it up as an import. Titled The Worst Of Black Box Recorder and put out by the band’s US label Jetset (yes, more dark irony there...), the CD contains not only every non-LP track released since BBR formed in 1999, but all LP bonus tracks, a must-have remix of The Facts Of Life by Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker and Steve Mackey (under the name Chocolate Layers), and all four of the band’s videos in unedited—aka unbutchered-by-MTV/Viacom—form. Black Box Recorder (composer and multi-instrumentalist Luke Haines, founder of The Auteurs & member of Baader Meinhof; former Jesus And Mary Chain drummer & UK absinthe advocate and importer John Moore; and Sarah Nixey, former actress and one-time singer for UK band Balloon) deal unabashedly with death in many of their songs—not to be sordid or exploitative, but because it bears on life. On The Worst... they include a couple of covers that follow their formula of promoting the value of life through images of its absence: Jacques Brel’s Seasons In The Sun, and David Bowie’s Rock ’N’ Roll Suicide. Indeed, they may have the distinction of 1) being the band, owing to their name and to their lyrical focus, most likely to have been included in the overhyped list of 'questionable' songs and artists circulated this week among stations owned by radio-network-cum-entertainment-fiefdom Clear Channel Communications, but 2) flying just far enough below CCC’s Radar, so to speak, to be overlooked entirely by whomever assembled that goofy list. (While Clear Channel denies that it banned any songs, it has confirmed, as have individual stations, that the list is real but is merely intended for guidance. Whatever...) The set also includes a great BBR remix of their Tricky-tribute track Uptown Top Ranking. Full length videos on the disc are The Facts Of Life, Child Psychology ('Life is unfair/Kill yourself or get over it'), The Art Of Driving, and England Made Me. The Worst Of Black Box Recorder is a great introduction to a strange and complex band for those who’ve never explored BBR’s dark little corner of modern pop; and it’s a critical piece in any BBR fan’s collection. Four bites out of five. Rockbites ratings 5: life changing, 4: stunning, 3: captivating, 2: amusing, 1: annoying. According to the band’s UK label, BBR are working on songs now for a new album to be released early next year. | Black Box Recorder | | BBR on Jetset (US) | | BBR on Nude (UK) | | bio | | discography | | CD | | top of page | |
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