Green Pajamas - Northern Gothic
(Camera Obscura)

Keyboardist Eric Lichter drops by with two of his strongest Green PJs contributions since "Hush Your Violence" and "Glass Tambourine:" "Wild Wild Reefs" and "Coyotes and Comets." The latter is as hauntingly visual as the whole western sky in the midst of a meteor shower and ends too abruptly—as if we're owed a couple of extra verses to finish the story, and the former is more linear and melodic than the quirky, syncopated, angular material on his recent solo album, Palm Wine Sunday Blue. (It's also the only track on the entire album to feature all the Pajamas, making this a Green Pajamas album in name only; it's more-or-less a Jeff Kelly solo album, as he wrote 11 of the 14 tracks and performed all the instruments on 8 of them.)

After several feet-wetting albums, guitarist Laura Weller seems to have finally found her niche and her "Christine Crystalline" comes across more as a Green Pajamas song than a CONTRIBUTION to a Pajamas album. Perhaps this one just fits better in its surroundings and doesn't call attention to itself as a Laura Weller composition performed by the Green Pajamas. She is also the most prominent backing member on the album, appearing on nearly half of the tracks (by contrast, the rhythm section of Joe Ross and Karl Wilhelm only appear on two and three respectively!), and her recent collaboration with Kelly in the Goblin Market project has also eased her indoctrination into the clan, such that she's now thinking and writing like a Green Pajama. I'd like to hear a full album's worth of her angelic harmonies, rather than a few teasers tossed in amongst Kelly's material. Nevertheless, it's a downbeat rocker like This Is Where We Disappear's cautionary, anti-suicide tale, "Downslide," suggesting that Laura sure hangs out with a bunch of freaky chicks!

"First Love" is the heaviest track—approaching Sabbath-ian dimensions—on an already gloom and doom, sturm und drang release and is the most frightening and depressing track Kelly has ever written. It appears to be about the abduction/rape/drowning murder of an 11 year old, and on more than one occasion my mind was wandering back to those scenes at the end of Nick Roeg's classic Don't Look Now thriller where the red-caped midget murderer chased Donald Sutherland through the canals of Venice. Of course, Kelly tells us it's based on the novel of the same name by Joyce Carol Oates, but I like the Roeg connection just as much.

"The Cruel Night" feels like an outtake from the aforementioned Goblin Market project, but in the context of Northern Gothic and tales of murder, rape, fear, and tension, it works quite well here. It's one of Green Pajamas' best tracks since "Megan's Bed," with Weller's soprano providing a melodic counterpoint to Kelly's gruffer pronouncements. "Mary Ryan's Hair" (which most listeners will know by the recurring refrain, "Dark eyes and butterflies"—perhaps a small homage to The Spacious Mind's Sleeping Eyes and Butterflies release from a few years back?) sounds so familiar that you may find yourself mentally rummaging through Kelly's back catalogue for its source. A piano plays in an empty room... Kelly and Weller huddle in hushed conversation in the corner... then all of a sudden a crescendoing burst of music interrupts their mental wanderings and we're in the midst of what seems to be a cautionary tale of heroin addiction, as the "I give up" chorus gives way to a refrain of "I shoot up."

"Blue Halloween Moon" is essentially a rewrite of "Swans and Butterflies" from 7 Fathoms Down and Falling, so your mileage will vary according to your appreciation of the older song. This one is a little longer and the arrangement is fuller, so I'll give this a slight nod. And Kelly, ever the crafty craftsman, has another holiday song to add to his canon, ensuring the DJs in the audience will give this at least an annual spin. But personally, I'll find many other opportunities to get this on the air. It also gives Kelly an opportunity to rip off one of his patented guitar solos that has been sadly missing on recent full lengths.

So, while my overall reaction to the album is upbeat and encouraging, particularly in light of my disappointment with the Woronzow material, I still can't shake the feeling that it may be a long time before we get to actually hear a full-fledged Green Pajamas album. I'm sure it's merely a matter of conflicting schedules and familial and work responsibilities that probably prohibits bringing all the Pajamas together for a recording session. (Having interviewed them on three separate occasions on my radio show, I can personally attest to how difficult it is to get everyone in the same room together!) In the past, this has given their albums a disjointed, catch-as-catch-can feel—as if they were recorded on the fly with whatever members that were available dropping by Kelly's basement studio and recording their segments and then Kelly and Ross retiring to the editing room to do their magic and assemble a finished product, much like a director assembles a film from the flotsam and jetsam of individual scenes. Maybe because this is basically a Kelly solo album, it feels more cohesive than previous releases. Also, perhaps more than on any release since Megan's Bed, the pieces fit together like a tight little jigsaw puzzle, with nothing left over—no throw-aways or filler. For that reason, not to mention the much stronger material, this is their finest release since Megan's Bed, and will one day be rightly praised as a high water mark of their "Camera Obscura period."

jeff penczak 2003 jan 17