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Zen Arcade
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Zen Arcade
SST, 1984
RiYL: Fugazi, Minor Threat, The Who |
Arcade, through songs mostly in the first person, details a young man’s estrangement from his family and hometown. The unnamed character tries religion (“Hare Krsna”) and drugs (“When Pink Turns to Blue”), but only comes to the cynical conclusion that he is powerless to change his circumstances (“Newest Industry”). Then, oddly, there’s an unrelated song, “Turn on the News,” and a twelve-minute feedback jam. Listeners would have to wait for New Day Rising, released less than a year later, to hear the story’s conclusion. Sort of.
But where Zen Arcade fails as a narrative, it succeeds as a document of a band at the height of their powers. Drummer Grant Hart is in his element here, contributing crucial songs and pushing guitarist Bob Mould to greater heights in his own compositions. As the record progresses, the songs move away from strict four-on-the-floor tempos and the melodies and harmonies grow more prominent. Good thing, too, because if the entire affair stayed at the pace of the relentless opener “Something I Learned Today” and the frothing “Indecision Time,” the listener would be too exhausted to make it all the way through. Hart’s “Never Talking to You Again,” an acoustic number, fits in with these early ravers as Mould attacks his guitar just as he does on the “heavy” songs. “Pride” represents the pinnacle of the early land-speed record tracks, as Mould spits out his disgust with uncontained venom: “Why does everybody have to be like that?”
But then the band goes “Beyond the Threshold,” opening itself up to new instruments and new ideas. “The Biggest Lie” has Hart and bassist Greg Norton harmonizing the chorus sweetly while Mould raves. Hart’s “What’s Going On” is an undeniable two-chord stomp. On “Standing By the Sea” (with a bassline reminiscent of the early Cure) and “Somewhere” Hart improves his sensitve crooner credentials while Mould checks in with fireballing leads. Mould gives most of Side Three to Hart only to conclude the story with a dismissive “whatever you want, whatever you do, wherever you go, whatever you say.”
Oddly, Zen Arcade ends with Hart’s peppy “Turn On the News,” which might have been better suited to a separate single, and “Reoccurring Dreams,” which is a long and uninteresting instrumental with a lot of feedback and tape tricks. There are other songs on the album, like Hart’s truly weird “Hare Krsna,” which mixes the chords from “I Want Candy” with the application of every piece of percussion available in the studio, or Mould’s fifth-grade piano recital “The Tooth Fairy and the Princess,” which don’t do much to advance the album’s storyline. They do give it a nice interior texture, though, while the lengthy “Dreams” just inspires you to stop listening to the album a track early.
Despite its flaws, Zen Arcade’s status as a classic is entirely deserved. “When Pink Turns to Blue” is probably Grant Hart’s best song; “Chartered Trips” is surely Bob Mould’s. The sense of expansion from side one to side three (or “the first quarter to the third quarter,” for you CD users) is truly impressive. So pack up your belongings in a nylon carry-all…hear the porter’s call.
MARK T.R. DONOHUE | Mark T.R. Donohue is a prolific freelance writer whose areas of expertise include Rockies baseball, video games, genre television, English soccer, and pub rock. He lives in Colorado, where he cultivates the largest and creepiest private collection of Alyson Hannigan memorabilia in the Mountain West.