Review Summary: Night/day
The varied and constantly renewing group of musicians that
Mark Lanegan collaborated with continues to grow. This time it is Joe Cardamone, whose only source of musical achievements includes a not-so-well-known rock band,
The Icarus Line. While Lanegan’s quite hefty discography (with or without his stint in
Screaming Trees) eclipses the works of said band, as well as many records of those Mark collaborated with, it does not stop the renowned vocalist in his search for new forms of musical self-expression.
So, on the new record the musicians appear as their alter egos, whose names are in the title. And although it is not entirely clear why one is against the other, we do occasionally get a sense of two sides not gelling entirely or pushing each other in the opposite directions. Probably, preferences for certain genres are what is meant here. For example, Dark Mark flirts with art rock with acoustic touches, hypnotic and poignant vocals, and a somber atmosphere. Whereas Skeleton Joe deals with intense soundscapes that include synthy napalm mixed with samples, beats, and a firing of rhythms interspersed with moments of calm and ambient gazing.
Combining one with the other, we get a kind of schizophrenic character who dives into the roaring depths of the gothic and deathly disco promised to us by the musicians, and then resurfaces with a hangover to contemplate life in a melancholic and gut-wrenching way. This results in an album divided into two halves, signifying provisional night and day. And while the former turned out to be quite resounding and exciting, the latter ended up being a weaker part of the record.
Starting off on the night side, the opening track
Living Dead is an energetic cut along the lines of Lanegan’s sound with electronic touches in the background from Cardamone. What follows is
No Justice, stuffed with electronics and Mark’s vocals going well against a sprightly beat and noir melody. Then we switch to the day side, with the character getting lost in the midst of cosmic signals (
Lost Animals). The album breaks into the territory of present-day
Nick Cave and succeeds to a certain extent (
Hiraeth), and then switches to a mood of wistful tenderness. This is where something irreparable happens, with a complete loss of the acceleration gained on the first two tracks: Mark attempts to sing in a higher register – more emotional and strained, sounding like a dying swan. And instead of being atmospheric, it puzzles slightly, as such manner does not fit him.
With 16 tracks, it is unsurprising that some of them fall out of this well-organized clip. For example,
Burned feels more like a sketch with a redundant rap section at the end;
Crime is dark ambient with Lanegan’s intonation;
Traction is a scary bedtime story with a looped keyboard section and creaking guitar; and
Red Morning Sun and
Cold Summer feature ordinary ambient soundscapes.
But the deathly disco part is where the album is at its finest. The dance of the macabre takes place on a dirty dance floor, with the rock of Dark Mark intertwining with the rave party of Skeleton Joe (
Sanctified). Add to that a song well-suited for clubs –
Turning in Reverse – and epic techno with some progressive elements, resembling a full-fledged DJ session at an acid-filled event (
Skeleton Joe Manifesto).
By the end of the album, the day portion recovers, as if the main character comes to his senses. The most effective song here is
Sunday Night 2:30 am. It serves as a foreword to another Lanegan collaboration, this time with
Moby – the all-around wonderful
The Lonely Night. The mood filled with night lights, wind, loneliness, and contemplation surrounds the listener entirely. And the closing
Basement Door ends everything with a vision of an electronics-inclined and contemplatively atmospheric
Bob Dylan.
We can see that the result of this collaboration turned out to be effective and quite intriguing. Yes, the album does stumble in a couple of places, and the obvious solution would have been to split the LP into two parts rather than mixing them together. Nevertheless, it still deserves attention from those who appreciate Lanegan’s endless search and those favoring electronic music in all its forms.
