Placebo, Classic or Dud?

My favorite Placebo track is "Slacker Bitch" (or maybe "Slackerbitch"), a b-side I've never found on CD.

I've got "Slackerbitch"! A lot of the B-sides deserve some praise, and I'm currently pondering what would go on a CDR of just them. I really need to get the singles I'm missing...

No, that's fair -- I've always heard similar said about My Beloved Pumpkins because of Mr. Corgan, and for some it's just a step too far. Generally speaking vocalists who don't work for me can be saved or at least sublimated if the music is strong enough; in this case Molko *works* for me throughout, he suits his arrangements with ease.

Public image: well, high-fashion gay goths, sorta.

"Bionic" (maybe more as a demonstration of their 'take the noise, make it poppy' formula but a great demonstration nonetheless)

"Lady of the Flowers" (the first of their many desperate poisonous ballads, and still one of their best in that vein; the images may be straight out of Desperate Teenage Fuckups 101 but that's the reason why it works, I'd say)

"HK Farewell" (aka the untitled bonus on the debut -- *really* lovely instrumental and easily one of their best songs)

"Brick Shithouse" (as noted above -- ARGH NOISE FUCK YOU ARGH)

"Allergic (To Thoughts of Mother Earth)" (this is one of those songs that speaks both to the credit of Olsdal and Molko as instrumentalists -- the bass growl is just MONSTROUS, while the way Molko fools around with Sonic Youth noises as epic pop flourishes is quite striking; he's coming up with some crazy shit on the instrumental breaks!)

"My Sweet Prince" (echo, it's all about the echo on this song -- well, not just that but it's the subtle touch that makes this a shiveringly chilling, powerful song, it's like it's from a ghost -- also, the drumbeats)

"Summer's Gone" (their dreamy psych/4AD/Cocteau/gaze song in a way, everytime I hear it I hear it somewhat differently, but that's always what I think of -- it's an end of summer song but it's still a summer song, a sunset that contrasts "Pure Morning" if you like)

"Evil Dildo" (untitled track at the end of Without You -- probably the height of their Sonic Youth sprawl [har har] fascination, jettisoning pop structure entirely beyond a vague verse/chorus breakdown -- a neat trick for an instrumental -- crossed with "XYU" by the Pumpkins)

"Days Before You Came" (if it was just because of the Abba rip in the title, that would be fun enough, but this is a good almost-single in how perfectly it can kick up a hell of a racket and remain hummable)

"Haemoglobin" (Absolom in the lyrics, sorta; SY touches again in the music, distanced reverb on the vocals, LOTS of violence throughout -- check the way that the drums burst through at points like gunshots...like an abstract cascade of blood)

"Peeping Tom" (their best album-ender -- not counting the unlisted tracks at least -- and making up for all the ballads on Black Market Music essentially being rewrites of all the previous ones, pleasant but just okay; in contrast this is surprisingly heartbreaking and affecting, thanks to the radio-signal guitar parts, the faster pace offset by the slow, swinging cascade of the verse and the beautifully sad catch in Molko's voice throughout, especially on the chorus -- this could be their most underrated song, period)

"Bulletproof Cupid" (meanwhile, this makes for a heck of a way to start of an album with an instrumental rampage -- it's almost a way for Placebo to show by means of a formal exercise that by this point they had an entrenched sound of their own via a technically superior capture of monster feedback, rhythm shifts and electronic growls, and that it wasn't specifically tied down by Molko's voice)

"Sleeping With Ghosts" (a stretch, perhaps, but I see this song as their one song equivalent to Green Day's American Idiot, reading the current mood of things through their own particular lens -- holding-on-to-each-other romance in the shadow of war and death -- and I think shows that there's more going on with Molko's words these days than many fans or foes would credit him for; just as importantly, though, this is them in ballad mode trying to screw around with the form a bit, thus the nail-on-chalkboard guitar part raining down from on high (combined with all the other guitar parts too -- this is a surprisingly busy song when you get down to it, and there are all sorts of quick millisecond bits zooming throughout the mix...and then there's the dub bass and the skittering d'n'b-tinged percussion behind the main beats and...jeez, this whole thing gets even crazier as the song goes on! and then there's the extended coda I forgot about! this is a flat out spectacular song! that's what I love about this band, they keep being better than I remember them!)

"Something Rotten" (uh...I'll say more about this later, but considering I just heard this yesterday and it slipped by me and I'm hearing it now and it's seriously fucking with my head, I think there's more going on here than I realized)

"Second Sight" (in frenetic quick rock-out mode, but in a compressed and trebly sense that turns it into a sheer celebration, it's like a swagger but one where it's a pure control in what the band can do and they ride it so wonderfully well -- it's, well, it's almost like a Jay-Z album cut that's still brilliant, like they can do something in their way seemingly in their sleep and have it just connect down the way -- and frankly I love the use of the Herman's Hermits/Ramones "third verse/same as the first" gambit)

Whew. Um, so yeah, these are all great.

Together, we will bond together and fight the evil...with matching windbreakers.

Still, we can agree to (at times) disagree. Especially in our stylish matching windbreakers.

HI DAN!

ATTN ENGLISH BANDS: NO NEED FOR 'MATURE' DIRECTION UNTIL AT LEAST THE THIRD ALBUM OK? Le fucking sigh.

Pure ... Boring ... Pure ... Boring.

I love the production on Without You I'm Nothing so much, it's one of the best sounding nineties rock albums I can think of. Little things like when the hi-hats suddenly go double-time for a moment on "Pure Morning" (the more you listen to that track, the more you realise that the entire a vocal is a total red herring, about as important to the song as a whole as a drum click track).

Spencer, Ned etc. all OTM about "Brick Shithouse".

EXTREMELY well put.

There's going to be a massive post in a new thread here in a few days about Placebo from me, stay tuned...

but steadily got more bored and sick of them until it culminated in me and my friends being incredibly drunk seeing them at Reading 2003 and screaming at them "PLAY MOVE YOUR FUCKING FEET" (by junior senior).

And yes, Mr. Osborne did the production for that one.

- why do I still not "get" The God Machine? Objectively they seem really good. If that makes sense.
- why did I buy the "wrong" Pale Saints album?
- why did I buy the "wrong" Chapterhouse album?
- do you like any Marilyn Manson apart from Mechanical Animals (which I rilly like too)?
- why don't you rate Hex as much as you should (and have we discussed this in the past?)?
- where did my copy of Leaves Me Blind get to?
- Ned do you know/like Frente's second album?

* Might have been a had to be there moment in retrospect -- but I broke out Songs From the Second Storey recently for the first time in a long while and the sense of epic wallop and melancholia remained, though I think the trick is to realize the Cure roots more thoroughly in the quieter moments ("It's All Over" makes a new perfect sense after the recent Cure reissues)

* Well, Comforts was released in the UK only, might have had something to do with it

* Blood Music isn't wrong, just flawed. "Picnic," however, is some kinda genius.

* I just sold back all my Marilyn Manson aside from Mechanical Animals! Because I just hadn't listened to any of it in years! Ripped it all to AAC beforehand of course.

* Hex is wonderful, let us not split hairs. ;-) Interestingly, Spencer and I were talking about BP the other day and he said that he found Hex to be a letdown on release -- he had loved the earliest EPs with a passion but by the time Hex came out he was much more into early jungle imports, trance, etc. (this is 1994, remember) and that the album just seemed too minimal, lacking a sense of scope (I argued that there's depth to it in a different sense)

* I have no idea! But you should find that thing immediately!

* Don't think I heard it. Did they mutate into something mysteriously great?

As noted on the New Kingdom thread I started, not including Paradise Don't Come Cheap on 136 is a huge mistake on my part. If you haven't heard it, Tim, you really should at least once.

I am not moving house soon and having to pay bond and I don't have a tax bill or a credit card debt oh no.

Re Hex - that seems so odd that Spencer would think that, the very thing that I always feel with "The Loom" is how vast it sounds, a whole world opening up before yr ears.

"* I just sold back all my Marilyn Manson aside from Mechanical Animals! Because I just hadn't listened to any of it in years! Ripped it all to AAC beforehand of course."

I think Fred was advocating for Holy Wood when it came out. Stephen Thomas Erlewine on AMG likes the most recent two albums the best I think but then he doesn't rate MA so much so maybe I shouldn't be guided by him.

I do love Mechanical Animals though, what a great opening one-two punch it has.

"Ned, the second Frente album is astonishingly great. "

I'm glad you love it Edward. i think it is perfect in every way.

By all means get it. Use the thread and its links as well as my AMG review as a general guide for what it's like -- the rest will follow.

Also all of the Boo Radleys advocacy at the moment is making me itch to pick up Giant Steps or something.

As well you should. But find Wake Up too. ;-) (Actually, just find them all.)

I do love Mechanical Animals though, what a great opening one-two punch it has.

Yus. He learned from Ziggy well...

-- Hari A$hur$t

I feel the same way, and it makes me very sad. I listened to Sleeping with Ghosts and didn't dislike it but I didn't feel like it was a new direction or an improvement of any kind. I'm not a hater, so am I missing something Ned?

They blew me away live with "Without You I'm Nothing" (still my favorite song) but by the time I saw them touring for Black Market Music I was getting pretty bored with the formula, or maybe they just sucked at that show.

Is it rockist to think bands should be going in a 'new direction' by the time the fifth album comes out?

Sleeping is actually the 'experimental' formula now fully incorporated -- it is of all their albums the most focused, no song sprawls, it's all very structured, but what isn't immediately apparent upon listening to it is just how much is going on in all the arrangements, and there's often a *lot* going on. The electronic elements that were overly hyped on Black Market now often become part and parcel of the song, very closely intertwined in the arrangements, while there's always some new thing cropping up song for song as it goes. Taking Tim's comment about how Brian M.'s vocals are a bit of a red herring, there's everything on that album from fractured drum-and-bass/glitch to even *more* poppy Krautrock than "Slave to the Wage" provided to some truly gorgeous reclaiming of Cocteau Twins-style wash.

Combined with the little remarked upon strangeness-in-a-good-way of the two new songs on the greatest hits -- "I Do" is Brian taking the seemingly-simple lyrical gambit approach again and giving it a twist ending, while "Twenty Years" -- the actual new single -- was a very odd choice for such a piece, a non-fist-pumping-rock-out single that sticks in the memory as a weird singalong -- and I think that while it would be wrong to say they're suddenly mutating into something else all together, they *have* made a very conscious artistic choice and approach that is quietly paying off (and they're pulling bigger crowds than ever before in multiple areas -- check the huge French arena crowd they play to in Soulmates Never Die, note as well they can now headline a two night Wembley Arena stand and just completed an arena or maybe even stadium tour in South America). I have this sneaking hunch that you're seeing them in a Black Celebration phase that just might lead into a Music for the Masses one. Violator, not yet...but I wouldn't entirely be surprised.

Also, "Special Needs" - a great single, yes (in fact, my favourite single of theirs since "You Don't Care About Us" at the time, fits EXACTLY into the "Ask For Answers"/"Passive Aggressive" mould, so I think any criticisms of BMM as being a tad rote should apply as well. "I'll Be Yours", as far as attempts to recreate the sort of sinister creep of some of their angular-cocktail-crystalline-torch moments is just a bit... insubstantial? "Protect Me From What I Want" works better in French, strangely. And "Centrefolds" is not half as good a closer as "Peeping Tom".

I'll go back and relisten to SWG a LOT if you go back and re-evaluate BMM. Deal? Everyone wins...

See, here's what I mean by sprawl, though -- consider the extended unlisted tracks on the first two albums, or the final listed one on the first. Both those are much more reflective of a jam-and-see-what-happens mentality, improvisations -- not *entirely* without structure, but far more immediately inspired from the Sonic Youth side of the band's descent, by their own admission. "Something Rotten" does not sprawl in that sense, it is *very* aggressively and intentionally structured. So we might be using different defintions here.

I'm not impressed with the "electronic elements," either, for three reasons. It's not really new ("Pure Morning" "My Sweet Prince" etc.), others have done the transition more strikingly ("Eye" The Postal Service, Radiohead etc etc), and it doesn't change the fact that some of the songs are boring (all the songs edward o. mentioned).

All that said, I love your idea of them having a bright future a la Depeche Mode since the conventional wisdom would be that they are spent (singles comp out before a break-up and all...) If they release a single anyhwere near as good as "Enjoy the Silence" it's definitely possible, of course. Certainly I've converted a number of people who aren't even normally into "glam" or its ilk just by throwing on their first album ("Come Home" the perfect introduction??)

They're recording their fifth album now and the perfect example of a three-piece band defeating the 'well they released their greatest hits so that's that' blues in recent years already exists. Salut, Green Day! Anything is possible.

And sorry to put you on the defensive, Ned, I enjoy the long jams, too. It just saddened me to lose touch over the last two albums as they were one of my favorite bands. I will listen to Sleeing with Ghosts again; your optimism is infectious!

NB. On the "Brian's vocals as red herring" thingy, I kinda meant that strictly in relation to "Pure Morning" (though it may apply to other more recent tracks too). Otherwise in terms of the overall feel of the song his vocals on the first two albums are U&K - in fact "Pure Morning" is the only time that they seem devoted to conveying a non-impression, an absence, a placeholder-feel.

Aside from the singles, though, you get "Days Before You Came", which is basically an exact mid-point between "Brick Shithouse" and "Special K", and leads wonderfully into the latter on the album, the fantastic "Passive Aggressive" (my favourite Placebo song, builds on the "Ask For Answers" template - but with just an extra layer of bruising on top, and Brian's vocals on the "every time I see you falling" is just so... beautifully damaged), the shuddering, squashed and claustrophobic "Haemoglobin" (very juddery and disturbed, the aural equivalent of being cramped and uncomfortable) and yes, their very best-ever closing track, "Peeping Tom". That's the A-grade stuff. The hidden track is very good too.

The B-grade stuff isn't anywhere near as bad as people say. I actually think you'll really like "Spite & Malice" despite the fact that everyone else hates it - that's the one with Justin Warfeld's "rap" - but if you ignore the lyrics it's good fun in a kind of meaningless meaningful way. "Commercial For Levi" is short and probably hated by everyone ever because of the tinkling bell noises, but it's extraordinarily hooky and, gasp, quite cute. "Narcoleptic" I had almost forgotten about but it has a really fantastic ending, not too far from "My Sweet Prince", really. "Black Eyed" is perhaps a bit clumsy, as if they were wondering whether "Allergic" would have been better if they'd put on a soaring, anthemic chorus. It wouldn't have, but in no way is it bad.

The one mis-step I will concede is that "Blue American" is, well, very stupid indeed, pretentious in a bad way, but even then it's delivered with a bit of a knowing smirk so it's not completely without merit.

Plus, my favourite trivia fact is that the backing vocals on a few of the tracks are done by Caroline Finch of indie no-hopers Linoleum non-fame and I know that I'm the only person on here who considers that a plus but anyway.

I refuse to concede ground on this one - Ned, you are mentalist for preferring SWG.

I can barely remember the singles for BMM except "Tase In Men" which I quite liked - there was one with lots of drones in the clip which I was a bit meh about but I only heard it once or twice.

I will hold these hearings open for any late submissions but that was a persuasive testimony edward.

Yo Edward by the same token you should get Heather Nova album that I recommend upthread, I think you would like it!