Welcome back to the Shared Name/Shared Love series – those posts in which I take a brace of identically-titled songs and explains why I love each of them (and then usually why I love one slightly more than the other). In Episode Four, things get a bit racial… Well, not really.
| Death From Above 1979 – ‘Black History Month’ from: You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine [2004] |
Saul Williams – ‘Black History Month’ from: The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust! [2007] |
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Like many, I imagine, Death From Above 1979 first greeted my ears with the string-scraping intro to ‘Romantic Rights’. They sounded great. Plus they had added novelty value with their line-up: there were just two members, but unlike the White Stripes, it was a bassist and a drummer – no guitar – and the drummer did the singing.
Soon after that initial exposure, I went out to make a purchase. I can’t remember when this was exactly. It was sometime in 2004. Definitely prior to the release of their debut album – which came out in October that year. But it can’t have been too long before, as it was in video form that I encountered ‘Romantic Rights’ – and the version in the video is the album version (as opposed to this version from the Romantic Rights EP, which I just heard for the first time right now – released very early in 2004). The Internet doesn’t seem to know when the video came out. I’m fairly sure it was before they had to append the 1979 to their original name (because of a dispute with James Murphy’s DFA Records) too.
Anyway… at some point in the middle of 2004, I went out to make a purchase of whatever Death From Above release I could find. And all I could find was the Heads Up EP. It kicked ass – particularly the opener, ‘Dead Womb’ and the outstanding ‘Do It!’. It still kicks ass. It’s quick, but relentless. Every song is a short, sharp blast.
Reframed by this hitherto unknown frenetic earlier release, ‘Romantic Rights’ actually lost a bit of its edge. It is, relative to the EP, a softer song. But this wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. It felt more well-rounded and accomplished. It made me suspect the band had more to offer. I became excited at the prospect of hearing a full-length album.
I got the album, You’re a Woman, I’m a Machine, upon its release. And I was not disappointed. The general level of energy, though inevitably down from Heads Up (which probably wouldn’t have been sustained over an album anyway), was still high, with a great opener and a firecracker of a second single. And there was some subtle variety too, though mostly staying within the bounds of ‘Romantic Rights’.
Except for the real surprise – the album’s most subdued, contemplative song, placed smack bang in the middle of the album (okay, so “subdued” and “contemplative” are relative terms. It’s still fairly loud. But it’s a restrained kind of loud…). And it was called ‘Black History Month’:
Actually, what I like most about this song are the lyrics. This is rare for me. I can’t recall if I’ve gone into detail in any of these posts about not being a lyrics person. But, yeah, I am not a lyrics person. For me, the words are almost always the least important element of a song, especially when it comes to first listens. However, there are always instances of words slowly coming to the fore. And some exceptional cases where they jump out at me.
I don’t know if the lyrics to ‘Black History Month’ jumped, exactly, but I was quick to latch on to them.
Do you remember a time when this pool was
A great place for waterwings and cannonballs?
Perhaps nostalgia and regret speak to me?
The lyrics don’t seem to have anything to do with Black History Month, though. Apparently, the song is so-titled simply because it was written in a February – February being Black History Month. Not that I knew that, as I did not grow up in North America. (Nor am I black… but I definitely think it’s more to do with not living in the US or Canada.) Two white guys doing a song about Black History Month would probably be a bit weird anyway.
Saul Williams‘s ‘Black History Month’, on the other hand, was always going to be a more likely candidate to relate to the titular month – the black experience frequently being subject matter in Mr Williams’s work. A quick listen to the incredible ‘Black Stacey’ will give you an idea, if you are unfamiliar.
I mentioned that I am not a lyrics person. As you would imagine, I am not much of a poetry or spoken-word person, either. And all this has undoubtedly contributed to my relative lack of enthusiasm for hip-hop – I rarely focus on lyrics, so why focus on music in which lyrics are the focus? (Teenage me’s guitars-only rule probably also played a big part.)
It’s highly unlikely that I would have ever gotten in any way entangled with Saul Williams’s material had it not been for a certain Mr Trent Reznor. At that Nine Inch Nails gig in Glasgow, Saul Williams opened the show, having been invited by Reznor to join him on his European tour. His performance was electrifying – and very well-received by the audience, which consisted almost entirely of dour-looking pasty-faced goths, remember. The aforementioned ‘Black Stacey’ stood out. So did the enthralling ‘List of Demands (Reparations)’.
Soon, word on the NIN grapevine was that TR and SW were collaborating on something while on the road. That something turned out to be the next Saul Williams album (his third), dubbed The Inevitable Rise and Liberation of NiggyTardust!, released online (for either zero or five dollars – I was scabby and went with the free version. Sorry Saul. And Trent) in November 2007.
On its surface level, this is Nine Inch Nails fronted by a hip-hop artist (like How To Destroy Angels is, superficially, NIN with a lady vocalist). That alone makes it a fascinating prospect. But the level of collaboration and integration goes much further – even deeper than Trent’s dalliance with Dr Dre (ho ho ho). The resulting blend of styles yields quite a unique album.
Some highlights include ‘Break’ and ‘WTF!’. They do a pretty interesting version of U2′s ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday’, too. But for me, the best track is the very first track. A raucous call to arms to open the show:
Of course, these lyrics do nothing but jump at you. They attack:
Can you feel it? Nothing can save you
I’m tougher than bullets so, baby, pray to your savior
I never been shot, but I bet you I’m braver
I’m taking my spot, nigga, I ain’t afraid to…
But the backing track isn’t passive either: driven by violent, distorted, degraded, pummeling loops. And then, for the refrain, a chorus of dehumanized, manipulated backing vocals “chime” in. Next to this, the DFA79 track seems even more subdued.
Then two minutes in there is this bizarre eye-of-the-storm break. One of the oddly shifted vocals loops persistently in the left channel while Saul unleashes line after line, somehow covering a couple of millennia in about three-quarters of a minute. Before all those voices return for the end.
It’s a thrilling piece of work. So thrilling that it probably does the rest of the album a disservice, by obliterating the listener before the other songs even have a chance.
Listening now, it has kind of obliterated Death From Above 1979′s song’s chance of remaining in my mind. When it comes to this direct head-to-head, I think DFA79′s relative restraint is their undoing, as Saul’s track’s power dominates.
Or am I wrong? Which ‘Black History Month’ does it for you? Have your say:
