The Genius Of… The Modern Dance by Pere Ubu

Whatever your take onPere Ubuis (if you have one) it’s probably wrong, and David Thomas would tell you so to your face if he got the chance. The band (if it’s really a band) has represented so many different things over the years that, in truth, their creative lodestar has had a few different opinions on their function himself.

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可以肯定的是，他们的作品是从朋克的外界出现的最令人兴奋和不可预测的最令人兴奋和不可预测的之一，从少数开创性的单曲及其Iconoclastic First LP开始The Modern Dance，即将转45。

In its opening seconds you hear something familiar, and yet unfamiliar. The earliest moments of the classic不结合条约comprise a piercing, confrontational ringing noise and a riff straight out of the primordial thrashings of rock ‘n’ roll, before Thomas takes things to another realm with a vocal that is deeply hooky and very, very odd—partVan Morrisonworship and part performance art.

“I used to say that the bass player is actually the band’s guitarist, the guitarist is the bassist, the synthesiser is the vocal and I’m the horn section,” the singer once told theGuardian.

流行乐队

Pere Ubu were a band out of time. They introduced things—dubby basslines, strangled, trebly guitars, unselfconsciously arty live shows and absurdist proclamations—that would come to define post-punk. But when they started out, punk hadn’t happened yet.

在1970年代中期，托马斯（Thomas）居住在俄亥俄州克利夫兰（Cleveland）的“非常好的老建筑”广场上。这座城市的摇滚场景制作了乐队，其中包括15-60-75（或数字乐队），镜子，电鳗和托马斯自己的火箭，它们是死亡或垂死的。还生活在广场上或旋转广场的是音乐家和可能是正确的音乐家，他们很快就开始计划开始新的东西。

坟墓吉他手彼得·劳纳（Peter Laughner）的火箭是其中之一，建筑物的共同所有者艾伦·拉文斯汀（Allen Ravenstine）参加了一些EMS合成器实验。火箭的工程师蒂姆·赖特（Tim Wright）会演奏贝斯（在托尼·迈蒙内（Tony Maimone）中被另一个广场（Tony Maimone）取代之前，斯科特·克劳斯（Scott Krauss）是当地声誉的鼓手。汤姆·赫尔曼（Tom Herman）是一名钢铁工人和吉他痴迷，他愿意以新的方式使用摇滚乐的基本原理，这将成为他们的王牌之一。

Drawing a Blank

At first, Pere Ubu weren’t a band, they were an outlet. The plan was to make a few things and croak, but their initial singles produced a feeling of momentum alongside the fizzing creative excitement of the music. Laughner left in 1976 and died the following year from pancreatitis, brought on by drug and alcohol abuse. “Just put it this way, it wasn’t at all romantic to be around,” Thomas later told Charlotte Pressler.

Ravenstine, too, was in and out of the group, but by 1977 they were a fairly settled, well-oiled machine, having played weekly in Cleveland and regularly ventured out to perform at legendary New York punk spots Max’s Kansas City and CBGB. Cliff Burnstein, head of A&R at Mercury Records, was hot for the band and would eventually sign them to an imprint called Blank in time to put outThe Modern Dance, which was tracked with co-producer Ken Hamann at Cleveland Recording Co. and his own newly-minted studio Suma in rural Painesville.

他告诉他说：“鼓在同一个房间里，一个在70年代建造的旧房子里的木脸房间。”Tape-Op. “We had the drums sitting in one corner, on a small platform, 20 inches high. It had gobos around it. We were able to isolate it somewhat, to focus the sound.

“其他乐器通常同时在房间里。我们确实在附近的工作室附近有隔离摊位，因此我们可以将歌手或任何内容放在其中。大多数录音都是用基本曲目首先完成的，其次是吉他的东西，依此类推，然后是人声。”

Rock reimagined

The Modern Dancecontinued Pere Ubu’s rapid-fire early approach, pulling together a few existing cuts and tunes written in the studio. It has a grab-bag feel, the band pinwheeling from one spot to another with little concern for the listener’s attention to detail. Thomas is a tangle of surrealist energy at the record’s heart, with his his tirades and oddball melodies crashing into Herman’s wired playing, often at this point on a Strat or Tele Deluxe, which is both an attack on and appreciation of rock fundamentals—the two operating in tandem is like Luis Buñuel taking control of a Gary Cooper western or James Cagney gangster film.

Street Waves介于两者之间Television和the天鹅绒地下，赫尔曼的独奏是白炽的。在这一点上，他作为该团体唯一的吉他手的地位反映在混音中，因为Maimone的贝斯是他的主要陪伴伙伴。在笑声上也有类似的动态生活臭, where a pre-Fugazi bassline is answered by a screeching, braying Thomas, Ravenstine’s sax and some truly out-there free-jazz improv from Herman. It’s dizzying.

The closer,幽默我, was written for Laughner (“Another day? Well, suffer, for that’s the way of the west.”) and runs the gauntlet of Herman’s talents, with its dub riffage replaced by a patient solo and uber-melodic lead lines as Ravenstine ramps up the weirdness. Given Pere Ubu’s almost immediate decision to move on stylistically with the equally wonderfulDub Housing, there is a real feeling in these exchanges of a moment in time being captured. Punk was always very good at misplacing important documents, so it’s always a reassuring thrill to be able to revisit records like this and be transported.

Infobox

pere ubu，The Modern Dance（Blank，1978）

学分

• David Thomas – vocals, musette, percussion
• Tom Herman – guitar, vocals
• 艾伦·拉文斯汀（Allen Ravenstine） - 合成器，萨克斯管，胶带操纵
• Tony Maimone – bass, piano, vocals
• 斯科特·克劳斯（Scott Krauss） - 鼓
• 蒂姆·赖特（Tim Wright） - 贝斯（The Modern Dance和Sentimental Journey)
• Ken Hamann – co-production

杰出的吉他时刻

Street Waves

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