John Vanderslice – Romanian Names – Album Review
As James mentioned yesterday, our rising age was put to the test this weekend during a road trip back to our alma mater. I remember wobbling back and forth trying to text James to get back to the bar and hail a cab because I was clearly done for the night. This was, embarrassingly, at 12:30 am. Mind you, we had been drinking since six, but I can’t remember one night in my twenties that I embarked on a night of boozing and called it quits so early. I’m fast approaching my 31st year and nights like this remind me of my vulnerability and that life’s clock isn’t going to go into perpetual rewind any time soon. To connect this thought, yesterday I was finally able to spin the new John Vanderslice album, Romanian Names for the first time, and although I had big expectations by default, I had no idea how hard it would hit me. Vanderslice is 41 years old, eleven years my senior, and this boggles my mind. Vanderslice pumped out his first record when he was my age, and while most musicians these days start in their late teens or early twenties, all of JV’swork exhibits a maturity that can only be found through a dude with some years under his belt. It’s intriguing to think a guy at age 30 can put out his first album and then build that idea into something as seminal as Cellar Door so early (but yet also late) in life. Vanderslice is a jack-of-all trades, producing, collaborating, and pumping out lyrical brilliance for peeps in the know, and if for some strange reason you’ve been on a distant planet and have not caught wind of this genius, hop on board because Romanian Names fits superbly in his already successful arsenal.
The first area worthy of discussion is the lyrical strength of Romanian Names. Vanderslice grabs the audience from the start, weaving through ambiguous content and an overriding aura of sadness and loss. A few particular tracks pound home JV’s lyrical ability, specifically “Fetal Horses,” “Time to Time,” and the broodingly evil, “Forest Knolls.” In “Fetal Horses,” a high pitched synthesizer is laced with simple piano arpeggios and Vanderslice’s neo folk crooning. There are some swift guitar effects and an amazingly rich and textured sound from the analog recording process. Lyrically, he’s stuck in a push-pull relationship as he angrily states At least today your pixelated bloody face, it seems to me to be finally dead with you and him. Come back to me again. You’d break everything I have. “Forest Knolls” (kickass live video below) emphatically points to how sharp Vanderslice is. Reminiscent of the spooky narration in Sufjan’s “John Wayne Gacy, Jr.,” the track places the extended metaphor of deer lurking outside a cabin window to express intense pain and regret over not aggressively dealing with intruders into a past relationship. We’ve got food for weeks and weeks. All that blood would find its way to the carpet. Sitting there I couldn’t shake that guilt. As the deer walked free up the hill. As with Sufjan’s Gacy track, spooky and dark imagery emits the idea that the fine line between sanity and losing marbles is not always abundantly clear. Dude got cheated on and he let the guy get away with it. He’s filled with regret and pain. Romanian Names is chock full of poetic worth and the mere fact that the music is so damn good only adds to the effectiveness.
The analog recording process that Vanderslice employs creates a wonderful atmosphere of sound. At no point on the album does it sound sloppy, however. ”C&O Canal” includes xylophones, wood blocks, and tinny snare drum percussion to create an oddly soothing sound. In many tracks on the record the percussion is soft and simple, and this allows Vanderslice’s dominant vocals and harmonies to rise to the forefront. In the acronym track “D.I.A.L.O.” a trippy reversed synthesizer riff almost sounds like it’s being sucked back into the synthesizer and dual harmony vocal delivery signifies Vanderslice’s panache for creating excellent arrangements that make something complex sound completely simple. Simplicity is shown in the title track, as an irish-folk vibe is on full display with a simple acoustic guitar and Vanderslice’s teetering mix of soft and loud vocal delivery. When you fell off the balance beam, you couldn’t win. But you jumped up again. At times, JV decides to keep things simple and focus on the emotional content of his lyrics. It’s nice to know that he doesn’t need bells and whistles to hit an emotional chord. This happens often throughout the entire record.
Vanderslice has often garnered plenty of acclaim for the narrative structure of his albums. Whether it’s the mysterious Microsoft lawsuit or the tightly drawn reference to classic British poets like Shelley and Robert Lowell, it’s a poor decision to only listen to his work for musical sound. The narrative nature of Romanian Names is loud and clear as Vanderslice is creating a painful and sad depiction of life’s regrets and of losing things once loved. Obviously, this isn’t always an area where blame can be placed, and Vanderslice seems keenly aware of this. in “Tremble and Tear.” the album’s opener, the largeness of the track is juxtaposed by the softly pined, I can see her in the snow, snow snow and delicately placed lyrics of loss. In the previously mentioned “C&O Canal” JV hits the audience with probably the most interestingly placed lyric, I track down your friend. And won her heart over slowly. Then I walked away. Hope it gets back to you someday and immediately goes into a poppy and happy “la la la” session that creates the exact sarcastic machismo that many of us have felt when trying to get over a lost love. The album is narrative, but more strongly thematic, and its intelligence and sharp construction make it a 2009 release that is well worth all of the hype.
So at 41 years old, Vanderslice is in his 11th year of recording solo efforts. I suppose that eleven years into a career would signify one’s prime. We’re in full agreement that Vanderslice hasn’t dropped a bit or lessened his intelligently composed musicianship. Whenever I get an album a little bit late and I find myself struggling to find elements of quality, I think about albums like this that immediately sprawl outward into my nervous system in just one listen. I have no doubt this is going to be a great listen for many years to come. If you’re not picking this one up today, you’re a lunatic. Enjoy “Fetal Horses” and pick it up at insound.
John Vanderslice – “Fetal Horses”
Click here to buy Romanian Names right now through Insound!
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