Doin' The Mess Around

Blonde Redhead's New Album Explores Less Jagged Territory

originally published September 12, 2007

Blonde Redhead is now seven albums into a career that spans a dozen years. Despite having earned consistently positive reviews for its albums and having done its share of touring, Blonde Redhead remains well out of the spotlight, coasting waves of popularity in the indie scene but never quite breaking out. Even the band's connections to the highly respected Sonic Youth, Fugazi's Guy Picciotto and record labels Touch & Go and 4AD have failed to generate the kind of buzz and critical cache one might expect.

But don't look for Kazu Makino, the group's hypnotic singer, to complain. "I feel very comfortable being everybody's well-kept secret. I think it suits us well," she says. "I have a kind of a guilty pleasure about not being so huge. But then, of course, I have moments when I want to make money. I want to have a better life… But those two things seem to be quite separated. I'm not doing anything to make that much more money. I'm not making the effort to put myself out there more, because it suits us to be that secretive. I am a quite secretive person, so I'm sure it has something to do with that."

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If Blonde Redhead has viewed self-promotion and popularity with reluctance, the band's commitment to its music - and to a sense of stylistic adventure - has never been in question. The band was formed in 1995 in New York City by Makino (who also plays guitar and keyboards), Amadeo Pace (guitar, vocals), Simone Pace (drums) and Maki Takahashi (bass). The group soon came to the attention of Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley, who produced the band's 1995 self-titled debut CD and signed the group to his label, Smells Like Records.

Takahashi left the group shortly after the first album was finished, but the group pressed on as a trio and later in 1995 released a second album, La Mia Vita Violenta. Two years later, Blonde Redhead moved on to Touch & Go Records, and re-emerged with 1997's Fake Can Be Just As Good, followed a year later by In An Expression Of The Inexpressible.

These four albums took their stylistic cue from New York's No Wave scene. The band's sound, with its angular guitar lines and eerie synthesizer parts, could be both turbulent and dissonant, but with a notable amount of melody built into the songs.

The early CDs also established Blonde Redhead as an inventive musical unit eager to explore new directions in its music from album to album. Just how adventurous the band could be became especially apparent with the 2000 release of Melody Of Certain Damaged Lemons. On this CD, the first produced by Picciotto, Blonde Redhead pulled back on the noisier elements of the earlier albums and began emphasizing more melody and atmosphere in its music.

This firm basis clearly set the stylistic stage for Misery Is A Butterfly and new album 23.

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Several songs on the new disc, such as "Silently," "Publisher" and "The Dress," weave together layers of synthesizers, programmed rhythms and vocal lines that seem both pretty and fragile. The resulting techno-ish sound is a bit icy sonically, but melodically hypnotic and addictive.

Meanwhile, the album gets a nice bit of variety - and a few welcome jolts of energy - from songs like the chiming "Dr. Strangelove" and the rocking "Spring And Summer By Fall" - two songs with immediately enticing pop hooks. But the jagged sounds of early Blonde Redhead are almost entirely missing on 23.

The musical quality of the band-produced 23 took some effort, though. The ensemble arrived at the studio only with loose ideas to develop into full-fledged songs. It turned out to be a challenge, and part way through the project, the band recruited producer Mitchell Froom to work on a pair of tracks and help get the project on track. "We went into the studio thinking it was not going to be that hard," says Makino. "It turned out it wasn't all that simple."

But the effort was worth it and Makino says the band is pleased with the music that emerged on 23. "I do feel like we're getting closer to what we've been looking for," she says. "I think we were always a very explorative band, but I feel like [with] each album we've been getting a little bit closer and closer to that thing that we've been looking for."

She's satisfied enough, in fact, to wonder if the band will want to be as stylistically adventurous as it was on earlier albums. "I'm a little bit scared because I feel like we really like this album, and that kind of keeps us staying in the same spot," says Makino. "I hope we grow out of this phase, too - but I'm quite fascinated by the sound and the songs. We might just stick around in this phase for a little while longer."

Alan Sculley

WHO: Blonde Redhead, School of Seven Bells
WHERE: 40 Watt Club
WHEN: Monday, September 17
HOW MUCH: $15 (advance), $17 (door)