Randy Newman
Bad Love
»
Randy Newman
Bad Love
Dreamworks, 1999
RiYL: John Waters, Bob Dylan, Classical Irony |
In a post-pomo era marked by the rise of nuevo bubblegum (with a smidge of sex for spice) and the new sincerity, yesteryear's ironist can't limit him/herself to a Euclidean world of either/or/both, the artist must want it every way or not bother trying. At its best, Randy Newman's work explodes such distinctions. Heaven help the wayward Cultural Studies major trying to locate the New Orleans-born, Jewish, intellectual songwriter in the moral labyrinth of "Rednecks." Suffice to say, his irony has substance, bite, meaning -- like a 2X4 between the third and fourth vertebrae. The good news, for brooding cynics and budding misanthropes alike, is that Bad Love stands as Newman's best regular-release album in over twenty years.
Newman struts out confidently on the lead track. Backed by his trademark piano lines, the songwriter details a typical living room scene, a bemused TV nation bathed in a cathode-ray glow. Proudly extolling the virtues of "My Country" ("We got comedy, tragedy / Everything from A to B"), the singer playfully unwinds an extended screen metaphor with "real" feelings and emotions safely contained in the black box. By song's end, we've come full circle, revisiting a moment from Newman's first album, where before the young man from "So Long Dad" baldly dismissed his "Poppa," now he just wishes his grown kids would go away and leave him in peace.
Like so many of Newman's most coruscating strokes, Bad Love's strongest knife-twists conflate the personal and political. If "My Country" champions solipsism at the foot of an impassive god, then "The World Isn't Fair" ("If Marx were living today / He'd be rolling around in his grave") blithely trades social justice for California dreaming. Though Karl's vision of a society free of exploitation, discrimination and private property sounds kinda romantic, Newman's protagonist couldn't possibly sacrifice his mansion on the hill, guilt-free existence or the glorious sight of grade school mommies at orientation -- and after all, Karl, bless his heart, is a little naïve.
It's a testament to Newman's craft that the songwriter is so often confused with his "characters" -- he certainly bears more than a passing resemblance to the "froggish men" in "The World Isn't Fair." His irony and the complex responses it engenders are predicated upon a delicate balance, an ever-elusive critical distance which is just as likely to implicate the listener as its creator. The self-loathing has-been of "I'm Dead (But I Don't Know It)" ("Time you spend with me / Is time you lose") and the gruesome aged lothario of "Shame" ("You know I have a Lexus now" -- okay, I'll stop) represent two aspects of the same persona, whether it be Randy Newman, "Randy Newman" or combination of the two, the resultant ambiguity represents a genuine artistic risk and an open challenge to his audience.
This shell game is further complicated and enriched by Newman's musical settings. Well-entrenched in his Hollywood money gig, he'll never recapture the strange blues of his youth with its echoes of Harry Smith's "old weird America," but as recompense, he's mastered the musical art of all things Americana. "The Great Nations of Europe"'s bloody march is accompanied by brass fanfare, "Shame" features a Greek chorus of Shirley Goodmans, "Big Hat, No Cattle" prevaricates along to a faux-western shuffle. Throughout, Newman's piano-in-cheek arrangements function as a counter-voice (Flavor Flav to Newman's Chuck D) -- answering, mocking, chiding, heckling -- muddying an already murky brew.
Despite its obvious quality, Bad Love ultimately falls short of Newman's early '70s masterworks, 12 Songs and Good Old Boys, the album lacks their sense of focus, playing more like a collection of discrete sketches than a cohesive whole. Not that Bad Love doesn't proffer a compelling theme -- check the title. Love -- requited and unrequited, soured and wistful -- wends its way through more than half the selections, and from the lonely desolation of "Every Time It Rains" to the simple homecoming of "Going Home," the singer is even compelled to shed his ironic guise for a moment or two.
But the conflicted, emotionally complex "I Miss You" proves the set's most rewarding bad love song -- to the family he left behind in the '70s, no less. Verse after verse undercuts and denies, twists and writhes as the chorus continues undaunted, "I miss you." The battle closes with an unaffected "And I still love you," and whether it's the timbre of his voice or the sheer repetition of the title, you can't help but believe him. Not that Newman's going to be mistaken for Elliott Smith or Ron Sexsmith any time soon (thank God), but even an aging ironist has to look in the mirror sometimes. The album closes on a sarcastic plea, "I Want Everyone to Like Me" -- of course, he might just mean it.
SCOTT MANZLER |