Review Summary: “The Mediator Between Head and Hands Must Be the Heart.”
An artist in the purest sense of the word has total control over their work that they laboriously create and they do not care how financially viable it is. Because what they craft with their hands is apart of them. When producing art it can be likened to cutting open your chest in front of the world and showing an audience your beating heart that grows in stature as an artist gains praise and criticisms from the people. But the head is not always as likeminded as the hands as it controls what the hands will craft and can see that true art does not always sell to mass audiences. That is why the music industry is one of the most corrupt corporations as it is demeaning for many artists to sign their life and art away, just to sell a million copies, instead of creating works that mean something to them. It is sickening to think how this practice has continued on for decades and decades. It is really like nazism when it comes down to it as these fascist music tyrants use their rhetoric to amass a large amount of blind musical soldiers to follow them, that empowers the mass of the population every time it commits another faulted atrocity in the name of nationalism and money.
Music for millions of people across the world is one of the most important parts of their lives as they find solace in the many different genres that have been created with the hands of these artists for their longing ears to hear. It can tamper with any emotion that a person processes no matter how locked away or repressed it might be as it can set the mood for a late evening party, give one time for lonely contemplation, ignite political fury inside someone, or give one hope for a better tomorrow. No matter what the music is meant to do its creator can always be reflected in it and that is what music is suppose to be from the moment it begins to play to the final seconds of noise left at the end. For (No Pussyfooting) it has faced the challenges of trying to be commercialized as music executives held disdain for its unmarketable sound that remained completely pure under creation by the hands of Robert Fripp and Brian Eno. That is why this record still holds up today not only as art, but as it art in its purest form.
The opening synth of The Heavenly Music Corporation that begins the twenty one minutes of bliss provides one an entrance into this ambient realm. It’s unfamiliar sound for listeners can be daunting as the music does not progress immediately into a verse. Instead the sound of the guitar comes in to create a mix of sound that many can see as mere background music. But this is much more then the soundtrack to any inattentive listeners life. It is a call to arms against what a song can be. For in the sound of the Eno’s building synths and Fripp’s soulful guitar playing one finds the time to contemplate the brilliance and beauty that has been put to record to be consumed by the listener. But here there is also time to reflect on what music is as listener sees the staunch differences between what the heads of the music corporation wants produced by the hands who mold these works together. As the song progresses the listener feels as if they are dreaming and this music is the soundtrack to a new world without the constraints of humanity flaws. It is a place of felicity, purity, and jubilation that each listener can call their own. It is the sound of freedom.
As the first track fades from the ears of the congregation the looped sounds of the next track Swastika Girls take hold of the listener in the distant far away place they have been left in. This time instead of reflecting the angelic sounds of the last song it shows another side to the world as the looped noise marches from one ear to the other. Giving the appearance of perhaps a disruption from one’s imaginary euphoria and that their still is a harsh reality out there. But this ponderous reflection never turns into a fear of as a the sound of the guitar joins in to the march showing that their must be a compromise for both to work together. Whatever is more thought provoking is when the heavenly guitar finally does return to the mix of sounds being heard. What does this mean? But then it stops abruptly, then returning again as it whales through the song like a fervid speaker that speaks nonsensically to you that leads you to deeper contemplation over what you are hearing. For although what you are hearing may not be the most impeccable masterpiece ever bestowed upon your ears, the statement and the foreshadowing of what it will do for music is inevitable no matter what criticism bestowed upon it. But then as the eighteen minute march ends the listener has an epiphany over all of this and knows justly so what the compromise is.
For the compromise made by this record is none other that in the creation of the mediator which will become the heart. For without it the hands and head would be unable to function and with it now taking a larger part in the production of art works like this were able to released by record labels to audiences to be consumed by their eager ears unfamiliar with these foreign sounds. The beauty possessed in this record would win overtly in this compromise though as the music that was released continues to remain relevant today in an age where ambient, electronic and experimental works are being released by a multitude of different artist on a variety of different labels. For their truly is hope in music to continue its evolution to stray away from the commercialized singles on the radio to craft something unique such as this that no one yet has heard before.
