I last spoke about UNKLE, so let's keep that connection here. As you'd expect if you read part two, Gavin Clark may have made UNKLE a big shot on this playlist. How many times did I type his name? How many times did I write something depressing?
Gavin Clark's solo and band work is vastly different from the EDM of UNKLE, but it's no less enjoyable or magical. Whether it be his singer-songwriter stuff or either of his bands, everything he touches becomes a supernatural daydream. Or maybe a nightmare? He started his career in film score for friends, but it never took off. But then those friends kept recognizing his talents and formed a band, even when he was ready to pack it in. That first band was Sunhouse, and they released one album. In 1998, Crazy on the Weekend became the greatest album in English acoustic rock I've ever heard. Admittedly, it's a tiny sample size. The whole cd/cassette could be on here, as it's a tiny spell book unto itself, but two tracks, in particular, stand out.
Despite painting a bleak forward, let's talk about an incredibly happy song first! "Spinning Around the Sun" is gently guided by a soothing acoustic guitar rift. It's a series of single notes that are just so happy. I don't know if I know how to jaunt, but I really want to. The lyrics jump back and forth between a current timeline and a past one. Presently, the singer tries to get someone to fall in love with them by trying to take them away from their "pain." The chorus and pre chorus indicate that it worked and are in the past tense form. Now they're living happily in a world with no weight. I get an existential nihilist vibe from the song. After all, we're all just spinning around the sun. Beneath all this is an accordion. It's a bit muted but is clearly there and is just as peppy. A harmonica and an unknown wind instrument also show up to this chill session because friends are good.
"Monkey Dead" is less happy. And if you gander at the lyrics, it's downright distressing. The music is a basic, slightly repetitive, acoustic chord progression, which doesn't change much. But the song never loses its luster or intrigue. There's a full band, which is kinda rare on the album, so maybe that's it? The lyrics take some thinking about. They give me a vibe that something in this person's life is terrible. Lines like, "kick me out of this blood-ridden bed, Lord." don't paint a pretty picture. To say nothing of "beat me blind" and this talk about a drowned monkey. The chorus has a haunting aura about not knowing where "it's" been, going, or if it'll make it through the night. It's made worse by how Clark sings it. There's something terrifying about both of these songs on the same album.
Sadly, Sun House only had one album. It reviewed well but didn't sell. They broke up shortly after, and Gavin Clark sorta disappeared for six years. Wikipedia has no information during this time, but he reemerged to form Clayhill. According to Spotify, they recorded two albums and an acoustic hits version.
The first song here, though, is a cover song. I didn't know this the first time I heard it, but "Please, Please, Please Let Me Get What I Want" is by The Smiths. The only thing I know about them is Morrissey is a wanker. Regardless of who's singing it, the song is a prayer to a god from someone at rock bottom. They just want one good thing to happen to them for once. It resonates with me as I've said the same things to a god I've lost all faith in.
Mine at Last is an album I haven't listened to a lot. Most of it is okay, but there are two more songs that belong in my spellbook.
I'm pretty sure "One Nerve" is an angry song, but you wouldn't guess that based on the instrumentation. It's mellow and relaxing, and Clark kinda mumbles the lyrics in his strange, radical way. The lyrics tell of a broken relationship. Someone who thinks too highly of themselves is "breaking me down one love at a time." I have a decent idea of what that "love" may be. The singer is tired of dealing with this "spoke in the wheel" and wants the narcissist to finish this. It's gonna hurt both of them, but the relationship is over, so why not? I don't know why this resonates so much with me, but maybe it's just the way the lyrics and the melody work together to form something mysterious. Or because I have a bad relationship with my parents. ...should l go back to therapy?
"Mari-Sol" is depressing, but I don't know why. It could be the guitar, which plays a few notes sprinkled between sentences. It's just five notes played in a way that kills the vibe while Clark does his mumble thing again. I don't know what Mari-Sol is, but its scenery isn't pleasant. Besides the dark clouds, the only other color related is the blue of morphine. I get the idea that someone important to the singer is gone or about to leave. He asks the question, "are you gonna fly alone here" as part of the chorus. The music picks up and almost starts to rock at this point, but it's still somber. Other lines seem to indicate that this person helped the writer in a few ways, and now they're hurt by this situation. I assume this is a drug thing based on the morphine line and the last few lyrics of the song. "Are you gonna kill the pain? With all but air in your veins? And who wants to die alone here?" There are still things left unsaid...
Small Circle is an acoustic album. It contains a few tracks from the previous album, a couple songs from a future CD, and some more random stuff thrown in to fill out the tracklist. I'm going to skip this album because I want you to decide what version is better.
Afterlight contains three songs on this list, which means a third of the album has wizard like attributes.
"Figure of Eight" is, in some ways, an odd musical arrangement. The drums give me D&B vibes, as they're something you might hear in hip hop. The only other instrument, though, is a simple guitar that I'm not sure is tuned correctly. Regardless, it only plays five notes for all five minutes of its runtime, and it's really upbeat. There are the occasional backing guitars that call the chorus to action, and the drums take a break occasionally, but those five notes just keep ringing. Towards the end, there's a cello solo? You can also hear that a bass has been playing the whole time at this point, so this song grows the more you replay it. Most of the lyrics seem to be about the chaos of life and the ebb and flow of time. Sometimes things work, and you meet someone you love. Too bad there's a lot in this world that keeps people apart. "I'm almost certain we're victims of circumstance." The chorus starts with a happy thought of love but ends with Clark wondering if Jesus is real. "We are but free will and fate in a figure of eight."
"Northern Soul" is probably the song I've heard the most. After a few seconds, where the instruments warm up, the song kicks into a few chords with a million other guitars in the background. Add in the drums, and you get lost in the melodic cacophony of acoustic fiddles. The verses are simple, but the chorus confuses this awful musician. Despite that, it's really exciting! It's so much fun to hear. The lyrics are similar to Figure of Eight, but it takes the opposite outlook. "New rain is gonna fall" and make things rough, but "new love" and "wine is gonna come." I don't know what a Northern Soul is, but they're the ones who can turn a river, tame a sea, and raise a nation. Go Scotland?
"Afterlight" is not a jovial tune. The untuned guitar is back, as is Clark's low hum. The guitar notes have a surprisingly large amount of bars it plays through, and it tries to end with some dissonance that I can get behind. Chords ring out and get louder during the chorus, but they somehow just get more depressing. Play a minor progression as loud as you want; it's still sad. About sixty percent through, a violin reminds us that life sucks. As for the lyrics, they're the downsides of the last two songs. Ultimately, the previous songs have glimpses of hope in them. But this song is about the sad outcomes of broken fate. "Will you make it back"? "We fall, and we lost." "We must have spiraled out of control." The common phrase that's sung several times throughout is, "Today's darkest cloud is yesterday's light." Time doesn't heal all wounds. It's a great ending credits theme to a sad movie, which fits with Clark's score history.
Before moving on, I just want to touch on Toydrum. I didn't enjoy Evangelist, which was posthumously released shortly after Gavin Clark died, but Toydrum did the ending credits for This is England. I've been writing this blog for three years, and it's shown that I'm not a great writer. And my music knowledge is even worse, and it's going to show here. I can't describe anything about "I've got a Future." It's got reverb, and that's it. The chorus sounds kinda happy, but there's no way these synths are uplifting. There's also the single most haunting thing I've heard in here. Through Clark's distorted and breathy voice, he belts out, "You're as useless as me." It's giving me goosebumps thinking about it, and I'm no longer in a good state of mind.
The first time I heard Gavin Clark's only (not OST) solo album, I kinda hated it. Hate might be a strong word, but I expected a lot more from the guy who vocalized my favorite UNKLE songs. It's a perfectly fine British acoustic rock album. If you're into that sort of thing, I'm sure it's great. At least, that's what I thought for the first half. Beautiful Skeletons is a double vinyl album, meaning it has four sides with a combined twenty two tracks. Side one are acoustic Sunhouse songs, so I have no idea where my head was a few years ago to find them middling. But track eleven completely changed my mind. But I'll get to that at the end...
"When We Had Faces" is a folk tune with a banjo. It's barely around while Clark sings to let his voice and lyrics shine. Otherwise, it's surprisingly jaunty! There's a relaxing snare drum in the back, and it's only there to remind you of the passing of time. There are a few more strings that show up during the chorus to fill the space. Despite the qualities, the song has a rather somber feel to it. And the lyrics prove it. The very first line is about a dead person. "They say the hand of god delivered the blow." But the writer feels guilt. The writer abandoned their friend a long time ago, and that was what led their friend to their death. And now the survivor feels an immense amount of blame. There seems to be a bit of remembrance going on, but the other verses make me rethink that. Apparently, this is another song from This is. England. I'm starting to think I should watch that to get context for these songs. Will that make them better or worse?
"Painted Glass" has the musical qualities of the last song. I may have a type. The same can be said about the lyrics. This time, they speak about hopes and dreams, but the vibe is they're doing it in a bad situation. The singer, and many others, have been alone for a long time. So long now that the singer has "been waiting for a death." The chorus is about how small the group has become. It's probably about war, but my weeb brain is thinking Eighty-Six.
"Never Seen the Sea" is as stripped back as you can get. Zero choruses, one guitar, and ten notes. As you should expect, the lyrics are about a dead friend. The whole thing is a eulogy about a friend who sought knowledge "but never seen the sea." I doubt that's literal, as the UK is pretty small, but the idea is poignant nonetheless. Especially to me, a man who's never seen the ocean but kinda wants to.
"The Russian" is one of the greatest songs I've ever heard. I couldn't make out the lyrics until recently, and I'm reading them for the first time as I write this. I hope they hold up! An out-of-tune guitar is the most powerful tool in the world, and "The Russian" proves it. It plays a simple harmonic raise until it plays a few sad notes and restarts. There's a backing guitar as well, and I think it just plays the chords of the single note guitar. The chorus does something similar, but it's a descending scale before playing a rhythmic, repeating solo. Despite being a simple guitar, the entire song feels frantic. It's almost terrifying that an acoustic guitar can do this. It's not mellow or sad, and an electric guitar would ruin the whole thing. It's not chaos by any means, but it's very controlled. It's almost hypnotic. There are no bridges, breakdowns, or other song terms I'm not 100 percent sure I'm using correctly, but, unlike the other tracks from the album, it lasts five minutes. But even then, it doesn't overstay. In fact, I kinda want more. And it's only one and a half verses and three choruses. Is this a horror song? There is more war imagery in the lyrics. "Sirens they are screaming, tearing through the air." Ultimately, though, it doesn't matter. The writer "doesn't need to figure out if I'm blessed, or I'm cursed." Their "paper thin existence" is brunt anyway. Despite the 'lax' guitars, Clark's voice has so much magic in it that it carries us to hell and back in five minutes. His producer, filmmaker Shane Meadows, knows talent.
I promise there are genuinely happy songs in my theoretical spellbook, but I just haven't written about them yet. Gavin Clark was a man whose life was, judging by his songs, filled with woe and sadness. He dealt with alcoholism throughout his life, and he died because of breathing complications from it. Many of his friends and musical contributors spoke lovingly of him when he passed. For a man who gave up on music, I can only hope his works will stand the test of time, and he gets the fame he deserves one day.
Will my next update be filled with joy? Will it be smaller so it won't take three months to type? Who knows?
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