Rogue Maels

Sparks are one of those bands that I always thought I could really get into if I ever listened to their stuff properly. So I used my formidable mind powers on Resurrection Jim and made him think he was sending me a copy of Propaganda out of sheer generosity/love and not because he’d fallen victim to my extraordinary mental powers*.

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Short review? it’s bloody bonkers and brilliant in equal measure.

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Marginally longer review?

Much of Propaganda sounds rather like three separate radios playing three of the more esoteric tracks from Queen’s 70’s output simultaneously, in serendipitous synchronicity.

Released 6 months after their blockbusting Kimono My House** this LP is an even more concentrated dose of Sparks. The whimsical wit and musical magpieisms of the brothers was perfectly set against the muscular heft of their British backing band as a foil and served up by producer Muff Winwood as immaculately as a tray of delicacies in the window of a Parisian patisserie.

Proof? look no further than my favourite track ‘Reinforcements’, which manages to sound like Gilbert and Sullivan gone glam rock. Sparks somehow manage to pull off that magical feat of creating their own logic, each song is the centre of its own universe, bearing no solid relationship to anything outside. It is a WHOLE LOT OF FUN^, which is very much something worth celebrating. ‘Reinforcements’ makes me want to preen and march simultaneously, whilst sniggering at how mucky and sly the lyrics are.

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I shall eschew the choux and not labour you with a track by track, merely serve you a soufflé of selections:

• B.C: A wonderfully whimsical operetta about a collapsed marriage, much sweeter than it should be.
• At Home, At Work, At Play: Wildly overdramatic, gloriously saucy and quite unlike anything else I’ve ever heard.
• Don’t Leave Me Alone With Her: ‘the exodus is on/the impetus is gone’, quite marvellously witty. Pulp owe a trick or two to this one.
• Bon Voyage: A sumptuous kiss off for the LP and a real sly high.
• Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth: Every bit as good as the title deserves it to be.

There are a giganillion flourishes, embellishments, curlicues, clevernesses and fripperies to admire and ultimately to adore, woven thickly right through Propaganda. That the bulk of the LP was written solely by Ron Mael – he of the terrifying fixed leer and HItler/Chaplin ‘tache, just makes me want to salute the man as a genius; bands have 40 year careers on fewer ideas than you’ll find on one side of this album.

I do hope I haven’t made Propaganda sound like it is hard work at all, texturally dense as it is, it is anything but a chore. Sparks convey it all into your cochlea lubricated liberally with winningly winsome melodies, great tunes and dynamic, umm, dynamics. The overall sound transcends glam rock and veers towards what would become power pop in years to come, when everyone else had caught up with them.

And whilst I am doling out the praise let’s hear it for Russell Mael who spends almost the entirety of Propaganda belting out perfectly enunciated tongue-twisting lyrics at lightspeed and/or hitting a perfect skyscraping falsetto^*. I doff my cap to the chap.

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So my message is treat yourself to some Sparks in your life, why would you not want to let some hysterically delirious, yet perfectly poised fun into your life?

After waging a costly siege
When a potentate ain't so potent in his state
He summons help fast
Unilaterally I withdraw     (Reinforcements)

Here endeth the Book of Mael and here endeth the lesson^^. Thanks again Jim!

1105 Down.

PS: Come on Ron, lighten up!:

PPS: Another clip from the low countries, worth it all for Ron’s chilling stare at 3:30-ish:

*I thanked him then and I thank him again now; just to maintain the illusion you understand.

**one day I will persuade some mortal to send me his/her copy, its been one of my most wanted LPs for ages.

^caps locked by accident, but taking a leaf from that bald bloke who used to be in Roxy Music’s book, I shall embrace my mistakes as the subconscious stirring of creativity^^.

^^or some such old wank along those lines.

^*explanation given in the CD’s bonus interview is that Ron writes with his right hand on the piano, thus already everything is in a higher register.