Although "Discothèque," the first single from U2's 11th album, throbs with a fierce mechanical groove, Ireland's fab foursome hasn't ripped out its rock-and-roll heart and replaced it with the electronic beat of techno. In fact they've been hereabouts before: Pop resumes the industrial-leaning experimentation that U2 first embraced on 199l's Achtung Baby and 1993's Zooropa. Several tracks ("Do You Feel Loved," "Miami") find them enhancing their stadium ways with the computer-generated crunch that technoheads like Prodigy and Underworld have brought to cutting-edge dance floors. Noisy and brilliant, "MoFo" especially is a blaze of pyrotechnic glory that makes Prodigy's "Firestarter" sound like a false alarm.
Unfortunately that's the only time U2 truly loses its cool. For an album long rumored to be a radical reinvention of a great band, Pop turns out to be surprisingly tame. Rather than making techno's blips and bleeps a vital part of its musical fabric—as David Bowie and Everything But the Girl have done recently—U2 seems to be using them for merely cosmetic purposes on sullen dirges like "If God Will Send His Angels" and "If You Wear That Velvet Dress." The twinkly effects and portentous basso ostinato that decorate the latter can't hide the fact that it's a melodically challenged trifle. Perhaps U2 should have taken one aspect of Pop's title—the part that suggests something at least vaguely hummable—a bit more seriously. (Island)
Townes Van Zandt
It is perhaps the final twist of a lifetime filled with them that when songwriter Townes Van Zandt died of a heart attack in January at age 52, he was just weeks away from the release of Rear View Mirror—a live best-of album that no doubt would have helped rejuvenate the career of this troubled Texas troubadour. For now, it will have to serve as a temporary memorial to the author of such powerful classics as "Pancho and Lefty" and "If I Needed You"—at least until a proper tribute record can be put together by the many folk and country artists (such as Emmylou Harris, Lyle Lovett and Steve Earle) who have long acknowledged this cult hero's profound influence.
Anyone familiar with Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard's hit version of "Pancho and Lefty" or Nanci Griffith's gripping "Tecumseh Valley" can attest to the timeless quality of Van Zandt's songs; they seem to have dropped from the skies rather than from an earthly pen. Hearing them sung by their composer, one feels the heart of darkness that created them. While his work often dealt with death (he was plagued by mental and alcohol problems since his youth), Van Zandt viewed mortality with a surprisingly healthy perspective. "It won't be long till I'll be tying on my flyin' shoes," he sings on one of the many riveting tunes here. Hopefully they've lifted him up to that peaceful place he could never find down here. (Sugar Hill)
Paula Cole
It's a delicate matter, balancing art and commerce. Musicians want to stay true to their muse and the creative spirit, but it serves no purpose to make something so insular and experimental that the general public can't relate. Such a juggling act is at the core of the evocative new CD from singer-songwriter Paula Cole.
Known best for singing backup on tour with Peter Gabriel, Cole has released an often powerful collection that examines the emotional facets of being a woman. To her credit she straddles the gulf between making art and making money. There are songs with (for pop) nontraditional structures, songs with spoken passages and then songs with sing-along choruses. (Case in point: Her video hit "Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?" is a wistful glance at a fading marriage.) But even when she aims for the mainstream, Cole, who has a lovely, unfettered voice, doesn't sacrifice the artist within. (Imago/Warner Bros.)
Pat Boone
Boone's handlers made a marketing mistake with this CD of ostensibly heavy-metal remakes: Despite the coy title and Boone's full-metal regalia on the cover, they didn't package this as a comedy album—the sole reason anyone in his right mind should buy it. The only metal in Boone's mood is in the big-band horns and arrangements on nearly every track of this kitschy collection.
Boone has traded in his white bucks for leather boots, but he's holding on to his goody two-shoes. Guns N' Roses' "Paradise City" could be about Jerusalem—not some sinful metropolis—judging by Boone's milquetoast delivery. His version of "The Wind Cries Mary" (again, smothered in jazzy horns) doesn't evoke Jimi (Hendrix) so much as Jimmy (Osmond). And "Stairway to Heaven" is straight out of Bill Murray's smarmy lounge-lizard Saturday Night Live skits.
Satire certainly has its place in pop (The Rutles, "Weird Al" et al), and Boone may have been hedging his bets and trying to play it campy too. But that only succeeds when the joke's not on us. And if you actually think, for a moment, that he's here to deliver ferocious heavy-metal classics, then (as Boone gently croons on the Judas Priest cover) "You've Got Another Thing Comin'." (Hip-O)
>Mojo Nixon
MOCK AROUND THE CLOCK
Best known for his hilarious 1987 MTV hit "Elvis Is Everywhere," roots-rocker Mojo Nixon, 39, has moved beyond Presley pantheism to more gonzo works, including "Debbie Gibson Is Pregnant with My Two-Headed Love Child," "Don Henley Must Die" and now "Bring Me the Head of David Geffen," from his 10th album, Gadzooks!!! The Homemade Bootleg (Needletime). When Nixon's Mojo isn't working on the road, he resides quietly in San Diego with his wife and two kids. Nixon—real name Neill Kirby McMillan Jr.—spoke with senior writer Steve Dougherty.
Mojo came from where?
The key event was, unfortunately, the death of my father. He ran a radio station in Danville, Va., that played soul music—"WILA: the black spot on your dial." He died about 20 years ago. Then I didn't feel so obligated to go to law school, as he and my mother had drilled into me from the womb. I have a big mouth—I could take on Johnnie Cochran—but I hate school, so I didn't go.
How did "Don Henley" happen?
In 1990 my wife made me watch the Grammys. Don Henley, who was in the Eagles—the country Monkees—was being hailed as Bob Dylan Part Two because he got a subscription to The Nation. I felt a need to say something about this.
Ever hear from any of your subjects?
Debbie Gibson took it with good humor. A friend of mine on radio interviewed her and had me call her on the air. She went, "Ooooh, it's that guy."
- Contributors:
- Jeremy Helligar,
- Billy Altman,
- Amy Linden,
- Peter Castro.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
