Them Apples

originally published September 19, 2001

DANIEL JOHNSTON
Rejected Unknown
Gammon

Nick Cave, who should know better than anyone currently drawing breath, writes (in "The Secret Life Of The Love Song"), "A love song is never simply happy, it must first embrace the potential for pain. Those songs that speak of love without having within their lines an ache or sigh are not love songs at all but rather they are hate songs disguised as love songs and they are not to be trusted."

Daniel Johnston's would-be love songs, including most of the tunes on Rejected Unknown, approach from the opposite direction. When he's on a roll, Johnston's diminutive onionskin reed of a voice vibrates with the humiliated rage of the wounded perpetual neophyte; his heartache is unquestionably, if surreally, malicious at its core. Johnston bleeds easily and writes hate songs about it. If crush-style love songs are warm, in their ceremonial naiveté, Daniel's are often so warm as to cause perspiration. No one is as easy to hate as he or she who makes you feel guilty, and Johnston spreads that sharpest brand of hate over himself, his memories, the 2D cartoon heroines of his affection and anyone who lends him an ear. In their uncut frankness and sensitivity, these tunes can be laughably irritating or profoundly comforting. Unlike hate songs disguised as love songs and the empty shells of human beings that enjoy them, Johnston's infantile bad vibes hide nothing. I dig that, hard.

While we're on the subject of Johnston, let it be known that Rejected Unknown is the most listenable thing in his catalogue; neither a musical indulgence (Yip/Jump Music) nor over-realized whimsy (Fun), it's relatively tight organic pop. His beyond-forced rhyme schemes and complete mathematical insensitivity are still a adore-it-or-ignore-it phenom; right now, I'd say they serve "Party" and "Devinar" terrifically and suck the hemoglobin from "Love Forever," but bad Johnston is still around when you're ready for it.

If the guy doesn't embarrass you just a hair, you're one up on me. But now that he's hit his songwriting stride, he's a less pitiful figure, and his sadness is more real than ever. And that's good.

DAVID CANDY
Play Power
Jetset

David Candy is 100 percent gone. The cat's a slave to his whim, maybe, but that's like saying he's a slave unto himself, and that's the one you wanna serve. And he's got a prismatic ambiguity about him. I'm tellin' ya, this is one fucked up chico, all the time pulling weird shit like dropping lonesome-funny monologues over swank, neo-mod Vampyros Lesbos sounding tracks. He's got a freak streak as long as 316 boxes of Altoids laid end to end up your auntie's driveway. He's an anachronism, but he's not a walking anachronism: He's copping z at 2 in the afternoon. He probably gets free food in the mail from his ex-girlfriends in other cities so he doesn't have to work except in the studio. I doubt he cares if you don't understand it. You think you've got his game of pimpadelic sorcery tagged and then you scratch at the eight.

David Candy is a side-persona of the Make*Up's Ian Svenonius, but it's a good thing no one told that first wave of critics this. They several times described Candy as "the male, American Death By Chocolate, and knowing about his main gig certainly won't help one formulate a better description than that. He's got the same borderline-facetious take on acid-soaked late-'60s mood pop, the same endearingly irritating blasé delivery on the spoken word numbers (the surreal pickup scheme "Incomprehensibly Yours" and the self-descriptive "Diary Of A Genius") and the well-chosen cover tune as permanent mixed tape staple (DBC's was "Who Needs Wings To Fly?" Candy takes "Listen To The Music" from the cult classic Wild In The Streets). Whether or not it's your swig of High Tide Gatorade during the second week of mid-summer mononucleosis, it's inspiringly imaginative.

No one digs that Jon Spencer-sounding Svenonius cheeseball like you see these basket-weaving, swirly-eyed flakes diggin' David Candy now. Like I said, the man's a convoluted case. A strange motherfucker, and you're one too by the time you've sat through this album. You too, my friend, are 100 percent gone. (67 Vestry St., NY, NY 10013)

FIREWATER
Psychopharmacology
Jetset

This time, I come to you, dear reader, as a fan, on behalf of one of the few functioning rock bands I care to proselytize for anymore. For all the hours of aural pleasure and psychic catharsis New York City's Firewater has given me, ’twould be disrespectful to throw its third record under analysis, I feel. And with that sort of attitude (disrespectful?!), I ain't gonna be objective. Not gonna happen.

I could tell you how, even as the band's superficial charm inevitably wears down (no surprise Klezmer numbers this time), it's managed to streamline its game to a swank, sophisticated peak. Firewater can now pitch its musty noir-rock straight and connect with rare subtlety.

For those who still sift for esoteric flakes o' gold, they're still there. There's a toy piano on "She's The Mistake." And there are military-style drums on "7th Avenue Static." And more. Make yourselves at home.

Lyricist and hyperliterate bellower Tod Ashley keeps improving with age as well: his last-meal wordplay, time-release wit and empathy for the usual roundup of strumpets and scalawags that populate his narratives (he seems particularly sad to snuff them out this time) cements his fingerprints on Jim Thompson's tomb.

But who cares? I'm just saying all this because I love Firewater with a deep purple passion I'll never quite articulate. If you were me, you'd buy, borrow, copy, shoplift or surreptitiously overhear this record toot sweet. Being you, however, I only ask that you bear with me as I get my aorta-flushing love for this record off my chest. It's the soundtrack to my interior monologue, and is likely to be my #1 record of 2K1 whether you give a tanuki testicle or not. Now, go put on something you like before your coffee gets cold. (67 Vestry St., New York, NY 10013)