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Hail the thief !
Bruce Soord and his comrades known as Vulgar Unicorn offspring
Pineapple Thief surely must have nicked the soul and spirit of
Coldplay, Radiohead, Elbow and Sabyia in order to deliver one of the
best alternative rock records for years ! In authentic British
humoristic style Bruce says “if I could sell 1% of the Radiohead
sales then I could retire !”. But all humour aside he’s right in
that nothing concerns the music itself anymore but it all comes down
to marketing. The Pineapple Thief marketing for this album however
is not a bad catch as the band offers one thousand limited editions
to their fans by including an extra album with brandnew material.
These extra tracks have been recorded in only one week and only have
the date and sometimes also the time as only information with the
guarantee that these recordings will never ever again be released
once this initial batch of 1000 copies has dried up ! And at the
time of writing only 90 copies remained so chances to get your
filthy paws on one of those 2CD editions is as unlikely as David
Beckham playing for Folkestone. You never know of course so keep
praying ! The 2CD package only has the letter D behind the catalogue
number. That’s the only clue you get so you need to have sharp eyes
!
But let’s focus on
the actual album first. Ten brandnew songs with as always as little
information as possible. All we know is that everything you hear
comes from the mind of Bruce Soord. To be honest with you from now
on you can call this guy Bruce ‘the genius’ Soord ! ‘We subside’
begins with a repetitive synthesized bassoon which could be compared
with Karda Estra but then Bruce’s unique voice sets in followed in
it’s footsteps by drums turning this into one hell of a popsong. The
way Soord adds strings makes it the kind of material we all will
cherish for a long time. Same pattern what ‘This will remain
unspoken’ is concerned which due to it’s acoustic guitar tends to
have some Pink Floyd moments. Experimental synthsounds during the
intro for ‘Vapour trails’ changing towards yet another perfect pop
format is the kind of material that turned Radiohead into
superstars. A similar kind of approach switching the unexpected
towards the pure acceptable is what the uptempo ‘Run me through’ is
all about. Once again a wall of strings backs perfect timing,
wonderful melodies and out of this world guitarplaying. My knees are
turning into jelly ! Someone get me an ambulance. Quick !
With ‘The bitter
pill’ the band illustrates that you don’t need a gigantic
arrangement to make a big impression. All they use here is a piano
but the melody and the intensity is enough to grab you by the balls
and never let go before the song is fully over. The beauty of that
piano can be compared to Chopin or Ravel if you like, simple but oh
so effective ! The same can be said of the classical introduction
for ‘Sooner or later’ and what a pity this band can’t use a real
orchestra because it would be so much more powerful. But the
intention is there, the will to progress, the ears for outstanding
compositions. The rest is only a matter of luck and perfect timing.
‘Part zero’ contains a more aggressive guitar whilst those strings
still remain in the background. ‘Keep dreaming’ has that ‘Karma
police’ element inside without turning into blatant plagiarism,
turning the rhythm a little slower. Wonderful how the choir sound of
the mellotron blends with kind of Salvation Army brass and the
acoustic bass. The actual album ends with the epic ‘Remember us’, a
16 minute musical orgasm fuelled by repetitive guitars, both
acoustic and electric. Guitars which suddenly switch towards
experimental noises surrounded by dark, low bassoon noises and other
synthesized brass. Acoustic guitar then sets the pace for kind of a
second movement which backed by a fierce rhythm contains some
Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark kind of synths making way for a
danceable atmosphere. The guitarsolo right at the very end is one of
the best I’ve heard in a long time coming to an abrupt ending as if
someone struggling for life suddenly gives it all up and dies. The
mystery of life and death contained in a couple of guitarchords !
Magic !
And now on to the
bonusdisc “8 days” which also sports ten brandnew compositions and
as said before is only available to the first one thousand
purchasers of the new album. Maybe this illustrates that Pineapple
Thief are not that ambitious after all because 1000 copies seems
very little if you want to conquer the world ! Maybe they’ll change
their mind one day and release this bonus material separately after
all ? The clever ones amongst you might spot a small mistake on the
print on the disc. This says that the material was written between
sunday 3rd november and sunday 9th november.
Of course the latter should read 10th november as there
are still seven days in a week even in Pineapple Thief land ! On two
occasions (9th and 10th) two songs were
written bringing the total to 10 songs in “8 days”. In most cases a
computervoice tells you what day of the week it is so when you close
your eyes you manage to cover a whole week in less than an hour !
The opening track is a very interesting composition with several
rhythm breaks and great accompanying hooks. In a way it has some Orb
influences turning it into a stupefying ride. One of my favourite
instruments, the Fender Rhodes, makes it’s entrance on ... ‘monday’
! Urban noises are mixed between the songs so to give it the feel of
one ongoing experience, recorded on the spot. Probably one of the
best commercial songs the band has ever written is ‘tuesday 5th
november 2002’. If this was given a proper single release with the
right financial backing then this would certainly end high in the
charts. A hit if ever I heard one ! ‘Wednesday’ gets a very solemn
approach by means of the keyboards arrangement. ‘Thursday’ gets the
‘repetitive acoustic guitar’ treatment sung in a ‘hazy’ way by Bruce
and also featuring ‘distorted mandolin’ (or is it bouzouki ?). On
‘Friday’ the band not only cleans their recording booth (you bet
they do) but also welcomes the weekend by delivering an energetic
song filled with distorted guitars and the repetition of the word
‘six’ (it was indeed their sixth day of recording ! but three times
6 after one another results in a devilish thought as well !).
Towards the end it contains some nice inventive guitarwork steering
the song into a more experimental direction. The first song on
saturday is a short acoustic instrumental kind of to introduce the
new day. The second song is much more alive putting kind of a
heartbeat into it all. Replace the synth by piano and you almost
certainly get a Coldplay original. Similar to saturday, sunday also
starts with an instrumental, rather ambient first part which gets
injected by a fierce rhythm as time evolves. An ambulance in the
distance introduces the final part of the band’s excursion. Again
this is more of a ‘real’ song structured by means of acoustic guitar
and strings. As throughout the entire album and bonusdisc Bruce
Soord’s distinctive vocals give the music a special charm, an
exclusive stamp that only reads “Pineapple Thief”. It’s the kind of
song that can enlighten an entire field filled with enthusiastic
music fans the world over, firmly holding on to their burning
lighters. Whilst the Moody Blues tackled one day for their acclaimed
“Days of future passed” album, Pineapple Thief took a whole week as
subject for their bonusdisc. Just like the Moodies it enabled them
to take on different atmospheres as everyday is different.
So is
Pineapple Thief prog ? If prog to you is the abbreviation for
progression then it definitely is prog but for the Mojo public let’s
simply keep it at being ‘damn good superb alternative rock’. Someone
said that music is more effective than the most powerful
anaesthetic. I have to confess it’s true. This new Pineapple Thief
material moved me to tears. Tears because of the injustice in the
music industry, an industry that keeps pushing forward Barbie-type
singers singing (?) spoonfed material. The listener at home thinks
he/she hears all there is to hear whilst maybe in their entire life
they will hear just one percent of what’s on offer. Due to that
attitude of the music industry REAL talent will one day go wasted
whilst untalented people will be able to afford a 10 million dollar
mansion and retire when they’re 22. That same industry is also
complaining that things are going bad, that MP3 is killing music. NO
!!! It’s the industry who killed music for giving REAL music not a
fair chance ! So I will do everything in my power to give these guys
the recognition they truly deserve. “Variations on a dream” is my
definite album of the year 2003. No doubt noone can beat the 11 out
of 10 I’m giving it ! |
