Hopes & Fears
Beginning with "On Suicide", Hopes and Fears is nowhere close to typically prog neighborhoods. It's not that RIO is so radically different than regular prog, but this is something else altogether. Chiefly, these are not really 'pieces' so much as actual songs. This is particularly odd given that Art Bears were born out of Henry Cow, a band more likely to eschew form than to adhere to it. Also, this stuff is obsessively non-pretentious. Taking their cue from Brecht, the lyrics here are almost totally non-symbolic, emphasizing description and expression over poetry and emotion. "In Two Minds" features one of many raw nerves when Krause's anguished adolescent protagonist proclaims, "Night is the only time I have/The only time it is quiet/The only time people are not trying to confuse me with demands." Try fitting that into a couplet. Of course, most people will immediately catch on to the music itself. Said music: pretty unqiue stuff. Now is as good a time as any to give Frith and Cutler their due as musicians. Although Frith has seemingly made a career of a chamleonlike guitar and bass hero, Cutler hasn't been as lauded with praise. Perhaps it's because his contributions aren't as immediately obvious - he does make a lot of racket on his kit, but he also plays any number of auxillary percussion instruments, and with Frith, cowrote everything. None of the songs sound the same. Gary mentioned The Who: "In Two Minds" erupts with "Won't Get Fooled Again" fury about three minutes in; "On Suicide" could have been a Threepenny Opera tune; "Joan" is a ragged durge until the woodwinds transform it into some strange Univers Zero interlude; "Moeris Dancing" is joyous polyrhythm that wouldn't sound out of place on a late Magma album until the gypsy violin comes in; "Pirate Song" shows just how delicate and vulnerable Krause could be. In a word, artful. This band doesn't get anywhere near the praise they deserve. Of all the avant-progressive music out there, it would seem that --Dom, Ground & SkySeveral years after Henry Cow's In Praise of Learning, members Fred Frith and Chris Cutler and Slapp Happy liedmistress Dagmar Krause banded together to form the Art Bears. The results here sit generally better with me than the Cow I have heard thus far, perhaps because of the tighter emphasis on composition over improvisation and the addition of Krause. The pieces feel intimate and there's a tight link to other chamber-comrades such as Univers Zero, particularly in the ghastly harmonium of "The Dividing Line," played admirably with a handful of other instruments by Frith. Highlights include the Brechtian "On Suicide," the instrumental "Moeris Dancing," and the included bonus single "All Hail!" Also, Dagmar was born to sing material like "Joan," where it sounds like she might have placed herself on a burning stake to get the performance. The album's centerpiece is "In Two Minds," which somehow manages to jump from character portrait with probably accidental references to family systems theory to an impassioned if overwrought tirade about "wealthy patrons of the state" (Cutler, I'm guessing)...all with nods to The Who thrown in just in case. Well, whatever you think after hearing this, you won't be able to say it ain't interesting. --Joe, Ground & Sky