Word: synths
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Ever since leaving Genesis about eight years ago, Gabriel has become an innovator and an active conscience in rock. His early single "Biko," which sets lyrics about South African repression to eerie synth guitar and tribal rhythms, proved to be a big hit at the recent Amnesty International benefit concert. But old Gabriel fans are going to hear little or none of his former complexity on So. Instead, Gabriel has filled this album with a bunch of love songs that are equally pretty and banal. In short, this will probably be the best Phil Collins album ever made...
...Gabiel's scratchy voice is perfectly at home singing funky love songs like "That Voice Again" and "In Your Eyes," his conception of what makes a good love song remains hazy and mired in cliches. These two tunes feature overly generalized and hence pointless lyrics set to often generic synth harmonies. Although Gabriel is capable of invading the mind of a political assassin, as he proved on the earlier "Family Snapshot," he seems absolutely at a loss to express anything interesting in his more amorous pieces. And his attempt at satirizing the pursuit of success, "Big Time," seems strikingly...
Perhaps, the greatest miscarriage on the album is Gabriel's one protest song, "We Do What We're Told (milgram's 37)." The title, with its reference to the famous sociological experiment testing mass brutality and conformity, promises a great statements, but all we get is some idle synth diddling topped with a few hoarse words. Now, I can understand the need to be unanthematic, especially given the subject matter of the "song," but in his quest for understatement, Gabriel barely creates any noise. Like much of this album, "We Do" leaves us saying "So What...
...Colourfield, the world's first rock band attempting to cross over into the field of Lechmere background music, was formed by vocallist Terry Hall, formerly of the Specials (a decent two-tone band) and Fun Boy Three (a synth outfit that gave the Go-Gos their first hit, "Our Lips Are Sealed.") With bassist Karl Shale and guitarist Toby Lyons, Hall strikes out after something different with this group, and regrettably...
...disk itself is a typical example of pseudo-punk synth-pop. "Motion" moves nicely, and the apocalyptyic "Guillotine Day," among other tracks, finds Amphlett attempting to mimic ex-Sex Pistol John Lydon. The result, however, is far closer to a Pat Benatar rehash than something new. Lyrics again center on love and relationships, and are generally rather mundane...