the Believer 2006 Compilation

Last year's Believer music compilation was one of my favorite compilations all year. The idea was simple; contemporary artists covering their peers. Likewise, this year has an idea that they are attempting to run with, which is marginal acts recorded live, often with binaural microphones. Frankly, last year's idea was better and produced a better album, but this year's comp attempts something quite different and succeeds in its own way.

Before I review the album, I would address a Pitchfork review of the 2005 Believer music compilation. While Pitchfork often offers sound reviews, its review of the Believer 2005 comp was one of the most troubled reviews I have read, and addressed the identity crisis that Pitchfork has. Ultimately, Pitchfork has a standard of new and interesting music chosen by its editors, and while it is thoroughly open to a wide variety of music, it has its prejudices, its limits and own collective self-denial. For example, Pitchfork issued its own mix of sorts on e-music which highlights artists performing at the Pitchfork festival this year. Of the twenty-four bands presented there is only one, Yo La Tengo, featuring a woman. Despite this there are many capable reviews of avante-garde, hip-hop, freak folk and metal, but frankly none of these are very far from a musical sensibility that is essentially an indie-rock one, and a potentially dated one subsequently, with groups like Modest Mouse and Pavement figuring as the subtext by which many artists are held.

Rob Mitchum, the reviewer for Pitchfork, began the review "if you're not already aware of it, The Believer is the life partner of Dave Eggers' literary journal McSweeney's" (Life partner? Are we supposed to read lit-fags here? ) is comically candid when he admits that Pitchfork is the "house that snark built," in response to Believer editor Heidi Julavets' declaration of snark-free intentions. Mitchum's review proceeds warily through the tracks, keeping an arms-length away from the freak-folk material, which may be passe soon, while not condeming it either. The only differences I had with him on a song by song rundown is a matter of taste. I thought Jim Guthrie's fine version of Nightime/Anytime was at best as good as the Constantine's cover of an Elevator to Hell song, and that the Espers cover of Fursaxa's "Firefly Refrain" and Mount Eerie's cover of Thanksgiving's "Waterfalls" were great tracks on their own. Minor differences, so what? It was the last paragraph that made me pause. Here is what I'm talking about:

"A collection of contemporary covers like this one might work with a greater variety of sounds, or at least artists who listen to a greater variety of sounds-- why is the music world covered by The Believer devoid of hip-hop, electronic, or anything not made by (usually acoustic) guitars or the occasional harp? While the magazine is usually adept at pointing people towards wrongfully neglected corners of literature and art, this insular compilation does nothing but point at itself."

It strikes me as conflicted that a compilation like the Believer's would be recieved as "insular" because it does not accurately represent the "musical world". As on the 2006 compilation, the editors seemed to be creating an album that cohered, and on which Jay-Z or Hot Chip would probably be more disruptive than anything. One of the only hip-hop related artists I can think of that would have made sense on the album is Cody ChesnuTT, partly because God only knows what he would cover, and partly because he doesn't really rap. The album coheres as a statement about marginal rock and folk, and what's wrong with that? For most people listening to the cd, being pointed toward "wrongfully neglected corners" doesn't necesarily entail dance music, and besides, are hip-hop and electronic music really that wrongfully neglected?

I think the struggle as a music-critic is always to be open to a field that would overwhelm you if you let it. Certainly classical and world music are not done justice on Pitchfork. But for Mitchum to criticize this album as being insular implies indie rock itself is a closed circle, and I don't think that's true. Without hip-hop we wouldn't have the beat on Cocorosie's "Ohio," without New Wave we wouldn't have San Serac's contribution, and without electronic music there wouldn't have been a Postal Service song to cover, albeit listlessly.

The final phrase is the most troubling, where Mitchum calls the compliation a finger pointing at the Believer's self. What Mitchum implies is that hip-hop constitutes some sort of other, and the various artists here, by virtue of being indie rockers, are therefore homogenous, and moreover homogenous with the Believer's readers. This is troubling, since Mitchum started his essay calling the Believer the "periodical meeting place for the young, hip, and literary." What is enuciated finally is not a fair critique of the album, but a testament to the insecurity of Pitchfork's take on indie rock culture. When stripped away from the false pretense that Pitchfork is firmly ensconced in the musical scene by virtue of a few hip-hop and electronic acts which sometime seem as symbolic as actually deserving of attention, we get a view of indie rock culture as a culture self-conscious by design. For Mitchum to critcize the Believer's insularity seems like a critique enunciated from a false position. Unlike Pitchfork, the Believer compliation does not presume to speak for "young, hip" contemporary music in toto.

Pitchfork's presumption to speak for "hip" music is both a source of the hubris articulating Mitchum's pointed finger, and the insecurity which drives Pitchfork staff to push outward toward the boundaries of what is important music. Obviosuly, I thought more of the value of this particular album than they did, but partly because I felt Mitchum looked at the album as a collection of singles, some good some bad, while I felt it worked well together. Similarly this year's album works well, keeping the proceedings intimate,by recording many of the songs into a minidisc player from live performances with binaural microphones, which, as they mention in the magazine, most closely approximate the hearing process of the human ear. On some tracks this works quite well, on others it simply sounds like standard lo-fi, but I appreciate that they had an idea and ran with it. The album features lo-fi folkiness by Think About Life and Six Organs of Admittance, a live Destroyer song, and a track by Sunn O)))'s Stephen O'Malley and a hidden track by Spoken Tongues. The only track I have reservations about is by Blood on teh Wall, which I have heard about but was dissapointed by here. The garage rock punchiness of it seems out of place and poorly recorded. Otherwise, the songs compliment each other, from the faux-owl hoots leading the album, to Leslie Feist's lovelorn lyrics leading into O'Malley's droning chords, to Mamadou Diabate's shimmering modal harmonies and finally to Dan Bejar's great lyrics, sung exuberantly over his Verlainesque guitar phrases. The magazine on the other hand, has some moments of lag. Despite the promise, Ben Gibard interviewing Wayne Coyne is a bit boring, and the sections on Don Delillo talking about Bob Dylan are not particularly illuminating concerning Dylan or Delillo's Great Jones Street. The Stephen O'Malley interview, on the other hand, is funny and charming. I wouldn't have previously thought myself to be a candidate for enjoying Sunn O))), having not been much interested after hearing their cd, but this interview made me put seeing Sunn O))) live on my things to do list.

My favorite song on this album may well be Neung Phak's "Cheer." I heard Neung Phak open for the Sun City Girls at the Empty Bottle a few years ago, and it was one of the best shows I've ever been to. Both acts went far beyond presenting music, and actively challenged the concept of concerts. Neung Phak began their set twenty minutes before they took the stage, walking through the dense crowd in a procession with flutes and chimes in outfits somewhere between indie geeks and Mr. Miyagi. They took the stage and began playing danceable songs heavily inflected with East-Asian seventie's surf rock influence, using a great deal of call and response between the male band and the two female lead singers. About fifteen minutes into the set someone began heckling them. Really loudly. It became obnoxious to the point that the person was making a scene, until to everyone's surprise, he jumped up on stage and began barking orders about how the music should be played. Most everyone was onto the premise unfolding by then, but it was no less a spectacle as it played out over the next half hour. The heckler grabbed the mike, scared the women off and demanded the band play the music in a certain way while he sang over it. Of course he began singing in Thai dialect as well, in a harsh grating voice which soon had the crowd and the musicians on stage heckling him. I remember this going on for a little while before the Thaiwanese ladies returned in very strange costumes, and what followed could only be described as an exorcism whereby the heckler, perhaps standing in for self-consciousness incarnate, was driven from the stage through the power of some ritual. It was not easy either; no aethereal song which made the heckler leave, but a rather violent (though not physically) and protracted struggle between heckler-demon and singer-angels which lasted for what seemed a long time. I wasn't sure if I had enjoyed what I had just seen or not by the time they finished; I had to think about it. I have thought about this show more than any other I've seen, surely a tribute to it in some way. The song on the Believer album on the other hand, while a bit bizarre, is nothing but enjoyable.

Also, you can visit the Believer's website and find an exclusive interview with Jamie Lidell.

*Pitchfork review of the 2005 music issue:
http://pitchforkmedia.com/article/record_review/16789/Various_Artists_The_Believer_2005_Music_Issue_CD