Geordie Greep

(Traduzione di ChatGPT)

Not even enough time to process the news of the Black Midi project’s closure, and here comes the first work to either fiercely defend, if you were a fan of the band, or scientifically dismantle with nonchalance, if you had any reason to dislike them: Geordie Greep's solo album is now a reality.

Eccentric, brilliant, divisive, iconoclastic—the former singer and guitarist of the dissolved London band proceeds without adhering to roles and conventions. The New Sound provides no answers to the questions we asked ourselves during Black Midi’s short but intense history. Experimenting, overturning the creative approach, and embracing a situational dialectic, these are what pushed Geordie Greep to create a polymorphous album. It might seem nonsensical to line up noise, prog-rock, salsa, samba, jazz, pop, funk, blues, and new wave dissonance, but beyond the bizarre alchemy, The New Sound reveals hidden passions. The feel is akin to a Steely Dan album submerged in acid—a grotesque, feverish, and sinuous jazz-rock that bridges the grandeur of Pere Ubu ("Blues") and the freakish soul of Peter Hammill ("Motorbike").

The New Sound remains, however, a bold pop album, delighting in samba and big band jazz in the extroverted "Terra" and altering the yacht-rock characteristics of "Walk Up" with dramatic noise and skewed grooves, two tracks that benefit from Geordie's decision to record the album in Brazil. The lyrics are an absurd, horrifying spectacle; in the single "Holy, Holy," he unabashedly includes the line "I bet your pussy is sacred too," while quotes and melodic digressions between the sacred and the profane try to offset the pop-jazz grace reminiscent of Steely Dan. Women birthing goats, orphaned fetuses, and incurable diseases serve as the backdrop to "Through A War," while rhythmic tempos of bossa nova, flamenco, and samba flow through—a clever and astute simplification of the euphoric music and lyrics that animate The New Sound.

The fusion mockery of the title track is the musician’s final stance toward those who often accused Black Midi of excessive technicality. "Bongo Season" and "As If Waltz" are two more excellent examples of music to experience beyond an intellectual level: in this sense, Geordie Greep's album is a bet that’s been won. Instead of past strategies, the young artist embraces a deceiving beauty while remaining a challenging creator. The album unfolds like a series of sliding doors, with twenty musicians taking turns at his side. These songs are the primary reason for Black Midi’s dissolution: Geordie had already stored them away, aware of the challenges he’d face if he attempted to realize them with the old band.

The twelve minutes and twenty seconds of "The Magician" are enlightening in this regard. The track was already familiar to the band’s fans, but the version presented here is remarkable: a song with powerful storytelling and perfectly crafted characters that breaks the atmosphere of insane tropicalia sustaining the album. The almost Hollywood-like theatricality of the arrangements and the constant cacophonies fueling its slow, burning emotional fade are a rare example of a song becoming a performance. This is one of the album’s moments where the prog soul reemerges (Hammill again), once more tipping the scales for Greep, who further surprises with a rendition of a Frank Sinatra song, "If You Are But A Dream," adding yet another layer of mystery.

27/10/2024