1 The House of Love The House of Love Relativity Records Words are neglected these days in rock music. Since Bobby Dylan spilled Blood on the Tracks there have been only a handful of truly obsessive, confessional lyric writers who have welded words to music successfully - Patti Smith, Elvis Costello and Morrisey immediately spring to mind. Guy Chadbourne, singer-songwriter of The House of Love, belongs in the above company. The group's stunning debut cements the fact that they are the best new band in Britain. They've just signed a deal with a major label and should be stateside soon. The group takes its name from Anais Nin's novel "The Spy in the House of Love," and like that book their songs deal mainly with the fragmentation of the self in love. The eponymously titled album contains finely crafted guitar lines, some ,heady adrenalin rushes and some moments that scare you shitless with wonder. The opening "Christine" reminds of the luscious melancholy of the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds coupled with the instrumental swirl of The Jesus And Mary Chain. It draws on a broken love affair and how the memory of a lover still haunts. Most of the record dwells on fractured relationships, fleeting liasons, self-doubt, faith and growing up. These lads mean serious business! "Hope" is about the violence in a relationship; the victim cries, "Hope is a dream and it screams in your head/ It's a lie..." The song "Road" is a boy's yearning for freedom. It's Kerouac on hot coals, Springsteen without the macho blue-collar mythology. "Sulphur" is wordplay to rival the great Costello. The singer proclaims, "Metaphors cut ignorance to pieces/ Just watch me crawl out of love." This all sounds self-indulgently depressing, here in print, but works brilliantly on vinyl. "Man to Child" is about a middle-aged guy reassessing his loveless life. Not a barrel of laughs! "Salome" has the tensile strength of Zen Arcade HUsker DU, and is sung by Jesus as he walks on water. "Love in a car" is about everything you've had but couldn't keep, romanticism to almost match the Velvets' "Pale Blue ,1 ,Eyes." The remaining songs are strange tales of doubt and loss of faith. In "Fisherman's Tale" and "Touch Me," the protagonists both seem to be waiting for Godot to show up. The album is littered with references to Jesus, and the predominant image is that of someone drowning in the ocean. Time and time again, Chadbourne uses the symbol/image of the sea to describe the emotional states of his personae. Freud would have a field day! The lyrics kill and the music perfectly complements their mood in every song. There's not one dud. The House of Love is as powerful a debut as R.E.M.'s Murmur was in its day. It belongs with all those other odes to self-destruction that you should have in your record collection. -Nabeel Zuberi Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds Tender Prey Enigma Records I'm a sick man, Lord. I'm a spiteful man. I'm not pleasant at all. There's something wrong with my heart. I've done wrong and now I'm gonna pay for it. That's fair enough, Lord. I've tainted these parts with my crimes, and now I have to pay. I knew that the day of reckoning would come, and I shoulda known that I had to prepare for you, Lord. In the car, just before they got me, I had me that tape of Nick Cave songs. I played those songs loud and often and I heard them deep in the empty pit of my black heart. Those songs bear upon me, Lord. They speak of the boat I'm in. Sometimes they speak the unspeakable. I'm making my peace, Lord. Like in the song, "The Mercy Seat," I want to burn in your holy cleansing fire, Lord. Those wires to my head will bring me deliverance from this hell on earth. I want to hear that celestial cascade of violins, and I want to fall with it to the place where there are no more judgements. "Up Jumped The Devil" was like those kid rhymes me and baby brother sang in the yard; its righteous rhythms made Mary Lou skip, and she looked so fresh and young and pretty in that blue cotton dress she got Easter time. Lord, she looked fine. When I heard "Deanna" over and over I just thought of her. It wasn't her fault, Lord. I was to blame. But "Deanna" rocked so fine, it reminded me of the good times, and what we had. It was deep, what we had. We were one soul, Lord. This Nick Cave fella, he sings of the sad and the good. He sings of the cleansing, too. "Watching Alice" had such pretty piano playing on it that every time we'd hear it, she'd put her head on my shoulder and close those deep blue eyes. It felt so natural, her leaning on me like that. When he sang "Slowly Goes The Night," I'd remember the times we lay together, and I would awake with her asleep beside me, and the thick, sweet smell of hon- eysuckle filling the morning air. She looked so peaceful then, Lord. The way I never was. This Cave guy musta loved someone pure and hard to have written a song like that. "Sunday's Slave" made me think of those stories Grandpa told about the old days, how things was different back then. He'd tell us about the whip- pings and the pain and the killing, and we'd be glad we weren't born in those hard times. But Lord, what really got me about these songs of Nick Cave was how they spoke to me. It was like he knew me and the things that I done, and was telling me the truth and setting me straight on the righteous path. That song "City of Refuge" shook me into belief, Lord. Every time I beard it, the big, thick vein in my neck would throb. You were talking to me, Lord. This Cave boy sure sings a song heavy and full, the way Elvis did. His voice is deep, rich and holy. The last song "New Morning": it was written for me, Lord! Tonight it's dark and the ground is cold but I know that at dawn you will take me from this sorry place and deliver me, Lord. I ain't running scared no more. -Nabeel Zuberi The Michigan Daily - Friday, January 27, 1989 -Page 9 Czech Alice: It's surreal as it gets Director Svankmajer creates film wonderland BY MARK SHAIMAN THE film Alice is touted as a "surrealistic" version of the Lewis Carroll classic, Alice in Wonderland. This led me to wonder about the original book: wasn't that a bit surreal itself? Whether Carroll was just tripping or actually treating Alice Liddell to a story is still debated, but when you see Alice, you'll instead be won- dering about the mental state of Czechoslavakian filmmaker Jan Svankmajer. The film is comprised of two types of cinematography, which adds to its enjoyable eccentricity. In addition to the usual live-action footage, there is stop-motion animation, the kind that brought Gumby to life. And with all the thought that obviously went into this film, it is clear that Svankmajer is no blockhead. However, he has added a few odd additions of his own to the original story. The White Rabbit is now stuffed with sawdust, Alice shrinks and literally becomes a (loll, and the portal to this new Wonderland is a desk drawer. There's very little dialogue, and all the lines are spoken by a single voice followed by a close-up of Alice's lips which say "said the rabbit" or "said the Mad Hatter" for whichever character is speaking. This is a bit disconcerting, especially because it's originally in Czech with English dubbed in - the lips don't even match the words. But it does have the effect of drawing you into the fantasy world that is being created, and that's the strength of the film. Since Alice speaks all of the parts, it becomes clear that the story takes place in her imagin- ation. But this point becomes fuzzy as the White Rabbit opens the desk drawer by clapping while Alice imitates the gesture to no effect. In fact, she winds up pulling off enough desk drawer handles to fill... um... a desk drawer. Thus, the delineation between the real and imaginary is blurred, causing you to think more about the film as an intellectual medium than as a piece of entertainment. For those of you who understand Surrealism, you may even be able to get more out of these films than this. But if you don't and want to, then this is as good a place to try as any, and in conjunction with the Surrealistic print exhibit at the Museum of Art, you can make it one hell of a weekend. And if you have no idea about Surrealism and don't care about it, then this can still be a fun film. You liked Alice as a child, and you can't honestly claim to have understood it all then. So why as an "adult" should you do things that always have to make sense? Take a voyage into your childhood, or finally find your way out, but make the trip to Alice. The Ann Arbor Film Coop presents ALICE tonight at MLB 4 at 7 p.m., 8:40, and 10:20. Admission is $2.50. Montreal Orchestra, Dutoit dazzle Az BY TONY SILBER "The MontrealdOrchestra came, saw, and conquered." That's how the Boston Globe described a 1986 concert by the ensemble under the direction of conductor Charles Du- toit. The same thing happened Wed- nesday night at Ann Arbor's Hill Auditorium. The orchestra came to town for one special show sponsored by the University Musical Society and captivated a packed audience of over 3,500. The program began with a soft rendition of Claude Debussy's Jeux, a dream-like impressionist work which stressed a rich string section with assistance from the eager woodwinds. The next selection called for world-famous pianist Radu Lupu as he and the orchestra powered through a terrific Schumann Piano Concerto in A minor. Following intermission, the orchestra took the stage for the dazzling Variations on a Theme (En- igma) by Edward Elgar. "It's cer- tainly an emotional piece which always affects me on stage," Dutoit said later. It is a piece which mixes the dynamic with the subtle, the bombastic with the tense, and Dutoit and The Montreal players did the brilliance of Elgar's work justice. After five ovations, Dutoit returned for an unscheduled work by Hector Berlioz which drew four more ovations. Following the moving perform- ance, I found a smiling and sweating Charles Dutoit in his dressing room signing autographs and telling jokes in his thick French accent. "I'm working just as hard now as I did when I started out. Fame hasn't really changed me," he said. Of his relationship with his players, he commented, "Oh, it's very good. We often all go out for coffee together and enjoy ourselves. They're a wonderful group to work with." However, Dutoit said he does not see himself in the role of teacher or mentor with respect to the orchestra. "(I'm) neither really, I'm more of a trainer. I help them along, that's all." Dutoit also had praise for Lupu. "He is so wonderful," he said. "I can't be objective." Dutoit described himself as very emotionally attached to the music he performs. "I'm looking for a mess- age in the music, so in that respect, I'm very affected by it," he said. The effect is certainly visible. Dutoit is a very physical and animated conductor who does a sort of dance in his conducting. It is as wondrous to watch as his energetic players. The Orchestra planned a day of shopping in Ann Arbor yesterday be- fore they continue their four-week tour in Lexington, Kentucky. Dutoit said he would like to bring his orch estra back to Ann Arbor. Let's hope so. A talent like theirs is a gift td any city able to enjoy them. We did. TIHE DAILY CLASSIFIEDS ARE A GREAT' WAY TO GET FAST RESULTS CALL 744-0557 *1 Thursday, Febr ruary 16 8:40 pm _; 0 Power Center " . .. \. ;t, . r= C y This Spring Break, Goreyhound' instead. For just $49.50 each way, you and your friends can afford to pile on Greyhound. Whether it's the beach, the slopes or your hometown, going Greyhound won't cramp your style. I W- I 'i - 1 1 #.