Huh! Maybe I proved my own point about the bonus tracks... for most of my life, "Too Late" has been just the song that got in the way of the sequence "Used To" - "Go Ahead" - "Former Airline". Intellectually I can totally make sense of the real running order, but it doesn't sound right. Weird.
Understand that Key Lime Pie had a replacement violinist. Originally the violin was integral to CVB's sound: half the tracks were instrumentals on the early albums. Long story short: Virgin wanted hits which require lyrics, violinist and all-around string guy Jonathan Segel left, vestigial violins came onto the KLP and it stopped gelling.
Meanwhile, Zen Arcade remains one of my favorite albums of all time. I wrote a treatise about it for an honors philosophy class: I had to xerox the inside of the album so I could transcribe the lyrics (back in 1994). I wound up putting the lyrics online because no one else had. I called the album a Hegelian romp, but that's most of what I remember from the paper.
Sometime I should try to write up a better explanation of that album. Even though tracks 1, 2 and 4 from Metal Circus are far more intense and meaningful as a standalone piece, Zen Arcade takes you all the way through
( ... )
Sure, Key Lime Pie had a different violinist, but I'm not sure that's the reason for the change of sound. Judging from Morgan Fichter's fiddle-playing in Harm Farm, she had plenty of interest in the sort of violin parts Segel wrote. (And my memory of seeing them in concert is that she tore it up on the old songs, though who knows whether current-day me would think so.)
It seems to me like Key Lime Pie has a lot of the kind of songs David Lowery would write for Cracker after CvB broke up, so I figure he's the one who drove the change. Dunno, though!
According to the Virgin years section on Wikipedia (for what that's worth), it was the producer driving for more Lowery.
You saw them live? I am cccccrraaaazzzzyyyy envious! I love that band to pieces. I'm even tolerant of New Roman Times -- it never quite sells me as a whole, but it works as a bunch of songs.
Howard Jones was my first major musical infatuation, starting at around age 7. I still wonder sometimes how much of his philosophy seeped into my own. I think I learned a lot about life from "Human's Lib"...
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(Enjoying these immensely, btw.)
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And thank you!
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Meanwhile, Zen Arcade remains one of my favorite albums of all time. I wrote a treatise about it for an honors philosophy class: I had to xerox the inside of the album so I could transcribe the lyrics (back in 1994). I wound up putting the lyrics online because no one else had. I called the album a Hegelian romp, but that's most of what I remember from the paper.
Sometime I should try to write up a better explanation of that album. Even though tracks 1, 2 and 4 from Metal Circus are far more intense and meaningful as a standalone piece, Zen Arcade takes you all the way through ( ... )
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It seems to me like Key Lime Pie has a lot of the kind of songs David Lowery would write for Cracker after CvB broke up, so I figure he's the one who drove the change. Dunno, though!
Reply
You saw them live? I am cccccrraaaazzzzyyyy envious! I love that band to pieces. I'm even tolerant of New Roman Times -- it never quite sells me as a whole, but it works as a bunch of songs.
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