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Arts
Page 10
Saturday, June 20, 1981
The Michigan Daily
X's 'Wild Gift'
The Pretenders
The Pretenders-'Extended Play' (Warner Bros.) For the most part, great
rock 'n roll has been produced by men. There really have never been any great
female rockers. So when I heard the first Pretenders' record last year, I was
stunned. Not only did the band manage a wonderful synthesis of heavy metal
and soul, but frontwoman Chrissie Hynde seemed a brilliant songwriter and a
fantastic singer. But before I began to salivate, I checked myself. "They can't
be this good," I repeated over and over (subconsciously remembering how Pat-
ti Smith had let me down), and a few of the throwaways on the album helped me-
maintain cynical disbelief. So I decided to adopt a policy of wait and see.
Well, I'm happy to report that this five-track E.P. leaves no ground for doubts
of any kind. It is flat out great from beginning to end and it makes it quite clear
that Chrissie Hynde is not only the best white female singer in the history of rock
and roll, but a diverse songwriter with a sure grasp of song structure ana
melody.
SIDE ONE OPENS with "Message of Love," which mates an off-beat riff
ETEN~Er
EXTEN'(EV hLA'(
with a melody from pop heaven-a positively inspired cut. "Talk of the Town"
is a piece of whimsy with a gorgeous 12-string arrangement. "Porcelain" is a
mostly instrumental tune that manages to sound like a heavy metal B-52s
without being funny.
As if all this wasn't enough, the Pretenders have almost single-handedly
rejuvenated heavy metal by injecting it with the blues sensuality that first
made it a potent style. Side two, which is more or less heavy metal, is the
sexiest music placed on vinyl since the heyday of the Rolling Stones ("Midnight
Rambler," "Brown Sugar," "Stray Cat Blues"). It opens with "Cuban Slide,"
the definitive sociological examination of Spanish dance in American culture,
and closes with a revelatory live version of "Precious"-the title describes it
perfectly.
So what we have here is the best possible introduction to the best rock band
now before the public. If all of this sounds too good to be true, just invest in this
five-song E.P. (only $3.99), and you'll see what I mean.
-Ken Feldman
T~flhI~h~i"Needs ride
tout of town?
Check the 4a iltV
classifieds under.
transportation
X-'Wild Gift' (Slash)-They're creepy,
they're kooky, mysterious and spooky,
they're altogether ookie - meet John \
Doe and Exene, the heart and soul of X
and the Morticia and Gomez of Sunset
Strip. Their first album, Los Angeles,
was a lowrider's cruise through the
cobwebs and brambles of that most tor-
tured of cities. Fun & Games & Fun &
Games & Fun stretched end-to-end
throughout the record, leaving the
listener wondering about what kind of
fun really is and, what kind scars you
for life. X walked through the vaporous
Los Angeles night with a flashlight in
front of them, caustically recording
whatever they stumbled upon.
On Wild Gift, X stares down the decay
once again, but also plays hanging something illicit, experiencing carnal
judge. Full of exuberant hard-rock evil, yet viewing it from a distance suf-
guitar and melodies that open up like a ficient to pass judgment on it.
letter bomb, Wild Gift puts up a mean Ultimately it all becomespeep-show
fight to maintain some dignity in a pandering, trafficking in stereotypes
bleached-out city, about the irresistibly bad girl.
THE SONGS are shattered fragments The passion of "Adult Books" is ap-
- partly beatnik wordplay and partly preciated, but lines like "Singles rule
overheard talk from a bus station or a the world/feeding on fresh blood" point
bedroom - everyday stuff made vital out the smugness that hovers around
by the language and the passion of the X's outlook on love. Whereas some of
delivery. When Exene wails about her the post-punk groups from Britain take
life being "marked down in the fragments from romantic situations
basement ... a life of intermission" and examine all of the surfaces, X
it's as if her low-budget angst has restricts the options by passing quick
helped keep her sane; in a world where and easy judgments
you can't get away from the hard BUT IF THE outlook on Wild Gift is
knocks and walking nightmares, she at times limiting, the songs themselves
can only roll all the contradictions and the delivery are wildly expansive.
around in her head and construct a Time and again Billy Zoom laces into
makeshift morality to protect herself, the melodies like Reggie Jackson
The morality makes for the best and leaning into a fat pitch. D.J. Bonebreak
worst moments on Wild Gift. X outlines never tries anything fancy, which is
a subworld of drunken rendezvous, why his successes are so astounding -
despairing betrayals, and flat-broke his drumming is a comment on the beat
worries. "We're Desperate" spells it as much as it is a statement of it. And
out perfectly, its stop-and-go punk most of all there is the singing of Exene
guitar putting teeth into the cynical and John Doe, hovering over the
humor of the lyrics. It's a two-minute melody like a couple of Pterodactyls
visit to the middle-class consumer circling their prey.
playpen: "It's kiss or kill/coca-cola / & "There's nothing wrong with
a Motorola kitchen / Nauga-hyde / & a Southern California that a rise in the
tie-dye shirt./Last night/ everything ocean level wouldn't cure," Ross Mac-
broke." Donald once said. Wild Gift is X's
In such a crappy setting John and poison-pen letter to a rough life, in
Exene (husband and wife) lean on each Southern California and elsewhere, a
other. Solid songs like "When Our Love nasty little wish that the big waves
Passed Out on the Couch" and "Some come soon. The strategies they have
Other Time" spell out their love as their devised for living in the anonymous
salvation. Love and infidelity circle megalopolis may on occasion be
around each other throughout the suspect, but their honesty and passion
album, every line full of funky, off-key never are. Wild Gift is an album to play
realism, over and over, a show of will and hard
STILL, it's hard to listen to Delta 5's noise that makes it just a little bit
"Try" or the Au Pairs' "It's Obvious" easier for one to think up his or her own
and then care too much about X's ideas schemata for individuality.
about relationships. Love doesn't seem
to just bring John and Exene together RI. Smith
- it separates them with a vengeance
from the rest of the world.
And their feelings about sex are har- Be an angel .
dly avant-garde. These notions are in
the great Southern California tradition
of Raymond Chandler, Hollywood
Babylon, and the Eagles. There must
be something in the reservoirs out
there, something which attaches
heightened seediness and smug
moralizations to the act of fucking. X
pours light onto tawdry love scenes,
peeps into the bedroom windows of un-
faithful lovers with a jaded cynicism
that is too easy to affect these days.
Their "White Girl" at first feels
almost as deliciously steamy as "Bette Read
Davis Eyes," and for much the same 764-0558
reason:. - We.. feel. .we'r.e.tasting ..
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