Black-Rich Music
Originally commissioned for a film,The Broken Giant, and released in 1996 in a very limited edition, this 20-minute disc has four rather vague songs (with a bit of lyrics lifted from D.H. Lawrence) and four brief instrumentals on their themes. The instrumentation's minimal--acoustic guitar, a little bit of wheezy organ--making it closer to Palace Brothers'Days in the Wakethan anything else Oldham's done. At times, the lyrics seem like he's feverish and hallucinating, especially "The Risen Lord," with its broken singing about fear of life, and "Black/Rich Tune," which is barely even a song: constantly on the verge of collapse, though the rough beauty of the organ acts like a vivid brushstroke, a minimal gesture that affirms life.--Douglas Wolk