Tripping Daisy - Polyphonic Spree - A double phantasmagoria

Here's another one of those bands whose very discussion seems to buckle under the crushing weight of a house-sized "What if…?" The game of imagining alternate scenarios can even be a kind of comfort, when the biography about to be recounted tells of sudden setbacks or changes of direction dictated by some mocking twist of fate. The story of Tripping Daisy inevitably falls into this category, but it hides a question of this sort even further upstream: had the Texan band not had such a flamboyant leader as Tim DeLaughter, what kind of artistic trajectory would it have followed? It's not too far-fetched to imagine that this now largely forgotten alt-rock outfit of the Nineties would very likely have ended up as a pale imitation of Phish or some other idle jam band born at the tail end of the previous decade: those were, broadly speaking, the group's expressive horizons in its early days. At its head, however, stood not merely a virtuoso musician or just another frontman, but a genuine genius — a label that is admittedly weighty and risky, though here it refers not so much to the man's actual artistic stature as to his gifts as a strategist, to the shrewdness and talent of someone who would later know how to start over from scratch, clinging with all his strength to a single, winning idea. This is the story of his musical creations, mad congregations from which first-rate artists such as St. Vincent and School Of Seven Bells would emerge.

Psych-pop firecrackers

Tripping Daisy formed in Dallas in 1990. Alongside twenty-five-year-old singer Tim De Laughter — almost a caricature of Ozzy Osbourne, judging by first impressions — were bassist Mark Pirro, drummer Jeff Bouck, and an eighteen-year-old guitarist, Wes Berggren. The four stood out on the local scene above all for the spectacular nature of their live shows, for which they employed a series of visual and lighting effects (improvised by an artist friend) that many compared to the legendary Joshua Light Show, which at the end of the Sixties lit up the Fillmore East in New York for the live performances of Jefferson Airplane, Grateful Dead and so many other stars of that mythical rock firmament. Far more modestly, the early Tripping Daisy were kids still held captive by those very same unreachable models, yet already possessed of the inventiveness needed to break free of them. After introducing themselves with an eponymous cassette of four demos, a first single recorded and distributed on their own dime, "Lost And Found", was promoted with such enthusiasm on local radio that the small independent label Dragon Street offered to produce a full album for them. When the band recorded it together with Patrick S. Keel, already a musician in several bands from the Austin area and the man behind the solo project The Pool, former Fever In The Funkhouse member Bryan Wakeland sat behind the drum kit.

Bill is a roaring alt-rock record with caramel-colored chrome, herculean riffs, and the first flamboyant vocal performance of a frontman who is both energetic and syrupy-sweet. The only truly original element of an otherwise conventional proposition is precisely this blend of muscular drive and easy-listening effervescence ("My Umbrella"), in open contrast both with the grunge phenomenon (whose long wave it nonetheless seems at times keen to ride) and with the roots rock and college-rock then dominant in the United States, as well as with the renewed punk-pop sensibilities that would forcefully burst onto the market within a few seasons. Not that Seattle is really all that remote a reference point, given that "Triangle" evokes the more meditative (or less metal-inclined) side of Soundgarden, and at times conjures the ghost of Andy Wood and his ill-fated Mother Love Bone ("On The Ground" or "Blown Away", with the odd glam trick thrown in here and there to liven things up further), whose genuine visionary streak is echoed here. DeLaughter sends his creature soaring over backdrops of pure fantasy, deploying well-timed hard-rock bravado: the result is at times gripping. Who-style theatricality stands out among the band's favored references on this debut ("Brown-Eyed Pickle Boy"), an affinity indulged with at least some restraint, keeping just the right expressive distance from the model without collapsing into mere gaudy imitation.

Honeyed, insinuating, with particularly well-crafted harmonies balancing out a thoroughly impressive rhythmic arsenal: from this very first release the group proves to be fun, bursting with life, animated by a joyous hysteria that finds its embodiment in the frontman, with a string of songs enlivened by a constant emotional and tempo rollercoaster, full of jolts, discontinuities and almost mystical surges ("Lost And Found"). California sunshine, in short, doesn't seem so far away either.

The record comes across as knowing, carefree and sufficiently sturdy, though still delivered within a fairly straightforward framework, without giving much of a spotlight (save for the pointless freak-tribalist oddity that closes the show, "Pink Jelly") to the artsy quirks and the weirdness that the quartet would reveal with far greater conviction a few years later. The hooks remain fairly convincing nonetheless, and Tim's hammy caterwauling ("One Through Four") does the rest.

Here and there a lush psychedelia surfaces alongside vague spacey touches, bolstering the naif credentials of an outfit that makes no secret of rummaging profitably through the melting pot of the late Sixties (emblematic in this respect, in the original edition, is the cover of "Green Tambourine" by the Lemon Pipers, later dropped from the subsequent reissue) and early Seventies, but with an entirely fresh attitude. At certain points one can even sense — paradoxical as it may sound — the handbrake being pulled: the band's ferocious explosiveness is palpable, yet it's almost never truly unleashed to its full potential, held back perhaps to make room for some aestheticizing temptation ("Miles And Miles Of Pain") that, while convincing, risks wearing the listener down in the long run.

Tripping Daisy nonetheless show they have clear ideas even while moving through largely uncharted territory that sales figures have rarely rewarded. They play indifferently with electric (mostly) or acoustic sounds, chasing sunshine-pop sublimation in both cases, amid saccharine falsettos, virtuoso crescendos and blazing accelerations, in a forerunning version of the indie-rock that would soon take off. The driving force remains the lovably over-the-top delivery of a talented yet anomalous singer like Tim, evidently on loan to alternative rock from who knows what artistic recess.

Bill comes out in 1992, and once again it's the local radio stations that secure it modest success across Texas. Impressed, Island's people step forward to offer the band a contract. The major's first release, aside from the already-mentioned reissue of the debut (dated July 1993), is the mini-album Get It On, hitting shops in early 1994 but recorded at a Dallas show the previous summer. In a live setting the Daisies sound rougher and more jagged, coming close to the firepower of a hardcore-punk band ("It's Safe, It's Social"). That impression is reinforced by the already familiar "On The Ground" and "Blown Away", which confirm their authoritative flair for flights of fancy and show a meaner, more muscular edge live compared to the studio versions. Furious episodes with a fairly conventional rock backbone, like the closing "We're Only Gonna Die" (a cover of Bad Religion), attest to an impressively explosive energy. Led by the title-track jam that became a staple of their live shows, the collection stands as a "stopgap" EP, spent mostly building loyalty and aimed at the hardcore of aficionados who got to know them (and started following them) through their live concerts.

But Get It On also proves to be a fine appetizer for the sophomore album the band had in the meantime recorded with Ted Nicely, a producer well known for his excellent work with Fugazi, Dead Milkmen and Girls Against Boys. I Am An Electric Firecracker, as the album is titled, is released in June 1995.

In the meantime the band's approach has grown even more energetic and daring, while also winking more decisively at alt-pop fans. More than ever before, the music of Tripping Daisy marries Berggren's muscular riffs with the frontman's unhinged singsong delivery, backed on this occasion by a rather impressive choral apparatus ("Rocketpop"). The band also navigates more relaxed, buoyant diversions like "Bang" with ease, all without ever giving up their colorful electric blasts over the usual shamelessly catchy refrains.

What results, then, is a record that toughens up the sound and emphasizes the expressive traits already shown before, opportunistically pushing toward pop and, on the surface, confining the alt-rock ambitions to the visual sphere alone — to the concept behind that enigmatic yet intriguing artwork, which clashes rather sharply with the irrepressible easy-listening cheekiness of the single "I Got A Girl" (which, not by chance, earns itself some heavy rotation on MTV). The tune, frivolous but irresistible, betrays Tim's prodigious melodic instinct and forms an ideal bridge to the saccharine explosions of the early Polyphonic Spree. The charts' flattery, with a sixth place on Billboard's alternative songs chart, would nonetheless find no significant follow-up, chiefly because of the band's sudden change of strategy as they grew ever less interested in the commercial fallout of their work.

The other single, "Piranha", is still formally cast in the mold of Bill, but with a brand-new exuberance: the sweet psych dislocations (à la Flaming Lips) of the grunge gospel return, with plenty of tonal variety courtesy of Wes's guitar, truly on form here. Also dormant, though not entirely so, is the jam band inclination the Daisies had shown back in their earliest live shows and would rediscover right at the finish line of their career — audible here above all in the slower, denser, more swollen tracks, like the splendid "Motivation" or the apotheosis of "Trip Along" (which still rides the lingering wave and visionary verve of Soundgarden of that era, the one behind "Black Hole Sun"), proof that slower moments open to contemplation have always been within their reach. It's in such passages that DeLaughter truly shows what he's made of, histrionic or evocative as the script demands, but never gratuitously over the top.

On the second side, the almost mainstream swagger is set aside and the weird streak takes over, with the quartet, free of any constraints, delighting in sketching out sunshine-pop whimsies, grotesque nightmares and childhood bogeymen ("Noose"), lighter acoustic interludes with lysergic trips thrown in ("Step Behind"), or indulging in some sinister evocations, bizarre arrangements and an enjoyably fatalistic tone ("Same Dress New Day", featuring a musical saw), raising their eccentricity index just enough to drift off amiably.

Elsewhere, the Texans' anarchic, vitalistic and joyously chaotic nature comes through more clearly, as in the punk-pop gem "Raindrop". The peak of this process, however, comes with the nearly ten minutes of the intense "Prick", still granite freighted in from Seattle but worked with their own chisel, alternating moments of clarity and rigor with childlike soliloquies. Tripping Daisy's proverbial bipolarity comes out fully exalted here.

Though it can't boast the stratospheric sales of many other rock bands of the period, I Am An Electric Firecracker is certified platinum in North America and remains the biggest commercial success of Tim DeLaughter's nearly thirty-year career. Despite decent exposure on international networks, the band is nonetheless destined to turn into a gamble Island has little appetite left to keep investing in. By the end of the year Bryan Wakeland departs to try his luck with the Meredith Miller Band, and his spot is filled for a scant couple of years by ex-Brave Combo man Mitch Marine, later a member of Smash Mouth in their twilight years. His name won't appear in the credits of any Tripping Daisy release, not even on the EP Island puts out in early 1997, Time Capsule, featuring material already partly known (a partial reissue of the EP Hook Music 1, originally released only on cassette at the end of 1995).

This collection of euphoric, knowing outtakes is a somewhat uneven interlude that, in a way, rounds out the band's profile at the point of their first major breakthroughs and helps make sense of the extremes of their expressive trajectory during a phase of deep transformation. If the wholesome punk-pop frivolity of "Cause Tomb Shop" shows the band still perfectly in line with the canons of their first two full-length albums, and the happy indie-rock stylizations of "Rise" are presented with even more restraint than usual (before erupting into blazes of considerable pyrotechnic scope), it's the central tracks that mark the clearest break with the past. "Boobie The Clown" is a noisy, sinister, very-Nineties passage, emblematic both of a joyously rebellious streak and of the disorientation of the times; but what makes the greatest impression, updating the Daisies' repertoire of eccentricities as they push toward bolder art-rock ambitions, is the fierce, malevolent leviathan fittingly titled "Creature", which over nearly eight minutes unleashes all the band's venomous impetuousness alongside their irrepressible unhinged verve. What emerges is a lively snapshot, curious and full of stimulating rough edges.

The almost adolescent softness of "Blue Train" and the more conventional acoustic garb of "I Am A Fish", stripped of the usual vocal whimsies, fall within the scope of more ordinary business, but if we add to the picture the gem "Margarita Tropendzando", a latin extravagance (released as the B-side of "I Got A Girl") that forcefully steers things back into jam-band territory, the overall balance can only come out positive.

A bomb that makes no noise

The year drawing to a close gifts Tripping Daisy the couple of decisive additions needed to risk the leap in quality DeLaughter evidently feels within himself. The slot left vacant by Marine is quickly filled by nineteen-year-old Benjamin Curtis, far more than just a promising drummer, while Philip Karnats steps up as a free-roaming utility player thanks to his considerable skills as guitarist, banjo player and trumpeter. The band has effectively become a quintet, and the difference is palpable, not least because Wes Berggren (trying his hand for the first time with mellotron, Ace Tone and cello) has never been so versatile. The new album, Jesus Hits Like The Atom Bomb, comes out in July 1997, still stamped with Island's palm-tree logo on the spine.

The blatant absurdity of this title and this cover art manages to throw off even the handful of people who had taken the trouble to follow the modest trail blazed by this strange Texan crew. A prophetic, millenarian-style condemnation? A pathetic conversion to trash rock by stadium-filling preachers? Or, more simply, a wind-up with a nod toward harmless, talk-show-friendly blasphemy? None of the above, thankfully. It aims instead to come across as a surrealist-flavored act of defiance, naive as often happens in music but ultimately consistent with the touch of a band that has finally mastered a style, a voice, a genuine identity of its own. Mastered it, in that they are aware of the possibility of an anarchic, dazzling purity hidden beneath the ordinary punk-pop crust of their beginnings. To all intents and purposes this album is a true portrait: the band at its best, as its leader would later point out. A perfectly unfaded snapshot of a state of absolute grace, one the Dallas band could have held onto for a long time, but would instead lose in an instant.

With I'm An Elastic Firecracker, which hinted at self-historicizing proclamations right from the cover art's nods to the mail art madness of Guglielmo Achille Cavellini, one could already sense gusts of delicious creative freedom within an otherwise still fairly conventional framework. Nobody, however, could have predicted the devastating easy-listening triumph the songs on the new album would deliver without offering any real warning signs beforehand: booking a rollercoaster tour for fearless listeners and kneading together the floral, psychedelic echoes already evoked in the band's own name with that sonic compactness Tripping Daisy had accustomed us to from the very first moment, undoubtedly the fruit of some kind of environmental imprinting. Judged with proper temporal distance, Tim DeLaughter and co.'s third album sounds unlike anything else: a jumble of circus offal with a beneficial, regenerative effect, a hypervitaminized concentrate of paroxysms, a collection of insane refrains stamped with the assorted electric branding of blaring guitars — in other words, surprise and bewilderment.

Choral vertigo, Wilsonian citations without any pedantic twee drift, melodic delicacies worthy of a romantic night out at the funfair, dizzying tears with the Who carved right into its heart ("About The Movies"), acid surges, space-rock detours hiding behind every damned "next bend" ("Waited A Light Year" being the best), and a miraculous simplicity illuminating everything, without any intellectualist strain-ing or snobbery. And, at its core, an almost obsessive celebration of childhood, written in a fairy-tale register that has always been part of Tim's nature but has never again reached such heights of sincerity and abandon.

If "Sonic Bloom", in particular, is a sunshine-pop delight steered with a sure hand by the frontman, careful to dodge the pitfalls of treacle and backed by a childishly open sense of wonder in his delivery, "Geeareohdoubleyou" sounds every bit as energetic as it is touching, and has no equal in sublimating the almost magical texture of memory.

Stylistically the quintet moves through territory occasionally already trodden by Weezer and few others, managing to elevate those expressive cues through an unbroken, captivating sense of wonder. To keep that inexhaustible marvel alive without tipping into sappiness, the band holds onto its playful, trotting swagger, not shying away from the occasional foray into even more unpredictable musical universes, as happens in the formidable, berserk rollercoaster of "Mechanical Breakdown", an electric party that marries jagged edges and childlike innocence without ever dropping the tone. You don't need any special expertise to recognize that this time around Tripping Daisy truly managed to shape an incredible musical kaleidoscope, an euphoric whirl and a treasure chest overflowing with surprises. Behind the string of colorful, joyously raucous (but never jarring) vignettes lies the decanted end of the age of innocence, handled with a mood that's melancholic and cheeky at once. The episodes placed there specifically to let listeners catch their breath dust off the band's excellent knack for a luminous, crystalline psychedelia, as can be heard in the two ecstatic movements of "Our Drive To The Sun/Can A Man Mark It?" or in the fabulous suggestions of "Human Contact", where the tightrope-walking apparatus behind Tim is replaced by a far more suspended, evocative dream-state.

The curtain hasn't fallen yet, and a bit more good-natured, double-speed strangeness finds room to raise the coefficients of a weirdness exercised, as ever, with a loose rein: from the galvanizing ideas of a Ben Curtis truly on fine form to the proud, controlled hysteria of the rowdy "8 Ladies", passing through a couple of other moments more geared toward reflection and dusk-lit tones ("About The Movies" and, above all, "Tiny Men", the last concession to memory before the final fanfare). Within the tiniest detail as much as in the harmonic apotheosis of the whole, the boundless, wild nature of imagination in power is glorified.

Masterfully produced by Eric Drew Feldman, once a foot soldier in Captain Beefheart's Magic Band (and later with Pere Ubu, Pixies and PJ Harvey), Atom Bomb still stands today as the brightest manifestation of DeLaughter's talent, one of the countless minor geniuses American rock has never stopped producing: perfect songs, that little kid-brother-of-Wayne-Coyne voice, walk-on parts for guitars, dulcimer and califone, plus a relentless nonsense streak in the collages of a booklet that Robert Pollard must surely have looked upon with admiration.

Despite the Island imprint, the album makes no noise at all on release, nor would it ever, for that matter. Its crucial role as a launching pad shouldn't be underestimated, though: for the frontman, who would soon reinvent himself as grand master of ceremonies in Polyphonic Spree; for his rhythm section (Pirro, plus the returning Bouck and Wakeland), co-opted into that lucky venture; and for Ben Curtis, who in the new century would make an impression both with Pink Floyd-derived rock (The Secret Machines) and with Stereolab-style revivalist pop (School Of Seven Bells), before an unfortunate end at just thirty-five.

A promise of good fortune that, however, would not hold for guitarist Wes Berggren, led down the wrong road by his wife Melissa, a femme fatale who a few years later would attempt a similar move on a then-budding local folksinger, Micah P. Hinson, without succeeding, but gifting him a wealth of inspiration he'd live off for another hundred years. Looking closely, it almost seems inevitable that death wanted to have a hand in all this revelry. Its presence can be felt running through every fold of this forgotten masterpiece of '90s power-pop: from the ghosts of "Field Day Jitters" to the closing funeral tribute of "Indian Poker Parts 2&3", in memory of friend Tim Taylor of Brainiac. Even the colorful spinning top smiling beneath the CD is a sad symbol. It tells of an experience that could only end soon: ⟦Q1⟧.

A star has gone out

In 1999, in any case, the band still manages to release a split single shared with Centro-Matic, Will Johnson's band — "Bedhead/ Love Has Found Me Somehow" — and, above all, the (ultra-limited) EP The Tops From Our Heads, both released on the small label Tim had founded in the meantime, Good Records. The latter is a long improvisation laid down by the band, now matured into a quintet, though still true to the anarchic spirit allergic to rigid structures typical of its early days: 22 minutes arranged into seven numbered sections — one of which is a dusty but philologically accurate, and therefore quite surprising, cover of the sunshine-pop gem "Never My Love" by California's The Association, a crucial source of inspiration according to the liner notes compiled by Curtis — plus a second side jokingly titled "Name Your Own B-side".

It's inevitable that, amid subtle psych and spacey abstractions (the melancholy little gem "Section 6", which gently drifts off), what takes center stage is the ringleader's visionary showmanship. Rather turbulent passages alternate with others that fold inward, restless and hallucinated despite their more restrained tone. The result is happily disorienting, feverish and incoherent yet thoroughly alive — the fourth movement especially, closer in spirit to the band's later work, like the almost gospel-like opening onto wonder in a "Section 7" that effectively serves as a real bridge to the saccharine-sweet anthems of the project DeLaughter would launch relatively soon after: this was the true direction Tripping Daisy was heading in as it wound down.

By the time the swan song resounds the following April with a self-titled album, the band has in fact already been officially disbanded for five months. The songs the group had been working on before Berggren's death by overdose are presented in their unfinished form, with almost no post-production intervention, out of a kind of respect. There is, after all, no contractual obligation left to honor: Island, already long gone in terms of promotion by the time the previous record came out, had dropped the survivors a while back, and so it falls to the miserable Sugar Fix to release this posthumous record.

The Dionysian euphoria of Atom Bomb already feels faded here, Tim's proverbial grin has by now been draped in bitterness, and while the songwriting remains essentially a pop marvel, the arrangements and the rather sparing decorative flourishes bring the band back down to a humbler, more earthbound dimension. Far less polished than usual, at least at the outset, this Tripping Daisy still offers its share of genuinely good, rough-hewn songs, testament to an extraordinary creative streak weakened only by misfortune and circumstance. A few welcome simplifications don't undercut the far-from-ordinary potential of the Texan band, especially in those moments that spend all their chips on energy and all-out pop appeal ("Kids Are Calling", opener "Community Mantra"), with decent effectiveness and less desire to dazzle at any cost.

While the tone remains upbeat, it's undeniable that these grooves also breathe a disenchantment never before expressed at such levels. Perhaps it's just hindsight coloring the listener's perception, but the band never seems to push the accelerator all the way down, and even in its usual japes it comes across as grave, furrowed-browed. It's impossible to listen to the record without drifting into idle musings on the denied prospects of the band and its guitarist, regret being a factor one must reckon with here, especially given the collection's unfinished nature. On "Soothing Jubilee", featuring Wes's father on Fender Rhodes piano, the melancholy turns aching once more but finds no clear outlet. If anything, lingering on it, one senses an underlying despair that not even the apparent delight of these ballads can fully disown.

"Drama Day Weekend" heightens the gloomy atmosphere, especially through the handbrake-pulled delivery of a DeLaughter we were used to hearing in rather different registers. Phlegmatic, rarefied and subdued in its resigned apathy, before blossoming into an overexposed, almost autistic psychedelic anthem of dazzling brilliance, "Tragiverse" is the album's manifesto track. Tripping Daisy, as they bid farewell, are by necessity an outfit with as many shadows as lights. The heart has grown heavy, the breath a little weary, and the litmus test comes with the somewhat muted re-recording of the old "One Through Four", perfectly in keeping with the record's tenor.

There's still room for the playful digressions that now, however, come across as darker and more alienated than ever ("Jim's Longtime Voice"), or ones buoyed by individual virtuosity, Ben's in particular, as happens in the bubbling jam titled "Halo Comb". The substantial plunge into introversion tends to intensify on the second side, where interesting passages still crop up, albeit in this form of, let's call them, demos dressed up as best they could manage. So with "This Cradle Song" yesterday's wonder is presented in fragments for whoever is still willing to pick it up, but the appetite for sonic debauchery or luminous phantasmagoria remains nothing more than a memory destined to bear no fruit.

What Tripping Daisy could have become with a different push and the right motivation is easy enough to imagine, but demanding something different from these guys, at this point, doesn't seem particularly sensible, and the guessing game remains a sterile exercise. One senses a kind of distance or coldness even, and especially, where the lyrics would seem to suggest a rather different emotional register ("I Am Good"), so this eponymous record can't help but leave us with a veil of sadness.

On "Foot Dance" even the old showmanship gives way to a composed but evidently necessary liturgy, the soundtrack to a heartfelt, fraternal yet hardly consoling farewell, one that in the decade to come would find an outlet only in the shadiest pages written by Curtis.

Tim and co. nonetheless bow out on the hopeful note of "The Sudden Shift Worried Him", awash in noise but also as colorful as expected, before fading into yet another grotesque space-psych-rock abstraction that in a sense circles back to Bill and closes the loop.

Strength in numbers (and marketing)

Only a few months have passed since the breakup, and the ever-restless Tim has already found a worthy pastime to keep himself busy. The Polyphonic Spree clearly emerge as a reaction to the abrupt end of Tripping Daisy, but their dawn inevitably unfolds under the banner of disengagement and amateurism, without any particular ambition. The singer gathers around him a congregation of a dozen musicians, essentially the original core of what would become the collective, purely for the pleasure of exploring the orchestral potential of some of the artists he grew up with, from the Beatles to Electric Light Orchestra, via Wings and the Beach Boys. Alongside him works a rhythm section made up of old bandmates Pirro, Wakeland and Bouck, but the lineup also includes string and horn players, keyboardists and guitarists. Within two weeks the band is already taking the stage with a nine-song (or "section") set lasting a good half hour, performing in the regulation white robes as support for Grandaddy and Bright Eyes, looking almost like a small evangelical commune or a hippie-gospel crew. The number of members soon doubles, reaching the sizeable total of twenty-five, and they self-record their first ten tracks (with the technical supervision of an Athens producer, Andy Paul Baker), officially intended as a demo to help land gigs and shows. As the story goes, The Beginning Stages Of... comes together in this entirely fortuitous way, but as a calling card for industry insiders it's more than enough: Tim and co. play to a home crowd when they perform at South By Southwest in Austin, a show that doesn't go unnoticed by critics and fills their calendar with bookings, the most important of which are opening for Divine Comedy (at the Royal Festival Hall) and appearing among the attractions of London's 2002 Meltdown Festival, personally handpicked by David Bowie.

The album opens on a grim note, with a mournful piano intro that horns, strings and vibraphone transform into a kind of prayer, a solemn litany punctuated by Tim's voice as a heartfelt tribute to his longtime bandmate. It's a mantra that grows in intensity, this "Celebratory", even managing to move you if you don't lose sight of what lies behind it. But the spirit can't (and doesn't intend to) stay so somber. Overflowing with enthusiasm, the ensemble lets loose with a joyous invocation to the sun ("It's The Sun") that closely recalls so many Seventies musicals, "Jesus Christ Superstar" first and foremost. The feel is warm and enveloping, and the constant rhythmic jolts and shifts in pace keep things lively, perfectly capturing a charmingly over-the-top sensibility. DeLaughter doesn't come across as just another ordinary frontman, but has the actual aura of a hippie guru, a grand master of ceremonies in a work that is as much performed as it is sung.

With "Days Like This Keep Me Warm" the mood turns intimate again but open to a woodland sense of wonder, warm and almost chamber-like despite being anything but sparse in its arrangements. Likewise, the mellow, narcotic cadences of "Middle Of The Day" hint at suggestions both sweet and disorienting at once, like a sonic opiate summoning a dream dense with unease. There's still a remarkable balance in the compositions and arrangements, and that proves enough to spare the Texan troupe's debut from the garish excess, the hammy bandstand bombast, the caricature or treacly sentimentality the band would sometimes fall into later on. Even livelier, sweetly freaky tracks like "La La" stay on a ridge of pop-tribalist oddness that invites genuine affection without ever tipping into tedium.

The three finest tracks — the paradigmatic "Hanging Around The Day, Part 2" and the two singles, "Light And Day" and "Soldier Girl" — are unusually tucked away in secondary positions. If here and there the flute flourishes are overdone, the aim is undoubtedly true, the performance is brilliant and the alchemy proves surprising, despite the inevitable share of oddities and underlying pomposity. A certain genuineness is confirmed nonetheless; it never slides into mainstream shamelessness, and even when venturing much further into easy-listening territory, the group remains, by choice, confined to a wholly communal, friendly dimension that never oversteps the bounds of sumptuous craftsmanship.

Tim, in short, had a brilliant idea but didn't sell his soul for the notorious thirty pieces of silver. He remains, in fact, essentially true to himself and, with the trick of a spot-on pseudo-philosophy, finally finds a wide audience willing to be seduced and to follow him, even if only for a short stretch. What takes shape, though, setting aside these catchier moments, is a genuinely strange record, mostly dark, like certain folk pages from a few decades earlier: a peculiar chamber-pop collection à la Van Dyke Parks, one that still favors subtle, strictly understated psychedelic allure over the genre's usual baroque flourishes.

Pleasant, but ultimately an ephemeral and marginal operation, beyond an undeniably considerable choreographic and strategic impact. The loops and vocal samples of Tim that fill the thirty-six minutes of the closing "A Long Day", somewhere between experimentalism and Philip Glass-style minimalism, also drag the rating down, amounting to a forced, out-of-place and frankly unlistenable outpouring.

The album is quickly promoted at home by Good and in Europe by 679 Artists, a Warner subsidiary, which with embarrassingly bad timing drops the Polyphonic Spree for "poor sales" as early as the start of 2003, right when, on the alternative circuit (in Italy championed above all by Massimo Coppola on "Mtv: Brand New"), they're establishing themselves as one of the revelations of the wider indie world. "Light And Day", in particular, ends up popping up pretty much everywhere, from Volkswagen ads to the soundtrack of "Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind" by Gondry, to great acclaim. The peak of this overexposure is the band's cameo in an episode of the first season of "Scrubs", while by the end of the year the troupe secures valuable endorsements from Grandaddy (the split seven-inch "The March/The Rugged and Splintered Entertainment Center", released on Birdman) and from the White Duke, who invites them to open the American dates of the "Reality" tour.

Meanwhile, alongside brand-new multicolored robes, the sophomore album is practically ready, once again recorded by Andy Baker together with a returning Eric Drew Feldman (the man behind the dizzying success of Atom Bomb). The release on Hollywood Records is scheduled for July 2004, but the album is also reissued in the United States two months later, in a new edition with bonus tracks (and a different cover) put together by the band's own label, Good.

Together We're Heavy presents itself as a continuation of its predecessor (at least title-wise), while showing itself far more assured from the very start. Tim and his bandmates open, in fact, with a convincing shade of splendor, a delicate, melancholic register that leans more than ever toward the fairytale-like, a grandiosity that's still not quite filed under "cloying", since it never tips over into mannerism and is instead well supported by the euphoric drive of this platoon of musicians and choristers: a formula that, at least at this stage, proves successful, able to surprise without overdoing the conceptual side, thanks to a genuinely dazzling freshness and sonic richness. Of course the line separating multicolored wonder from shameless gaudiness grows dangerously thin, but the Speekers (as they rebrand themselves in the credits) of Together We're Heavy know what they're doing, moving gracefully on extremely slippery ground and winning you over with the simplicity of their sweet spells.

On the obligatory big single, "Hold Me Now", DeLaughter takes center stage and the whole crew follows right behind him. The sugar-rush earworm is objectively lethal but also represents the band at the peak of its expansive, warm-hearted potential, garnished with high-pitched vocal harmonies and saccharine flutes. What's certain is that the shyness of the debut has been wiped away as if by an eraser, and along with it the shadows or nuances most inclined toward introspection. In their place comes an unbroken hymn to the joy of togetherness, a thundering triumph of communal fervor that does nothing to hide its own shameless nature but at least plays its hand in the open. Much the same happens in that other, wildly easy-listening refrain (the kind that inevitably demands a sing-along) in yet another ode to strength in numbers ("Two Thousand Places"), delivered as always in a spirit of fancy, frivolity and imagination unleashed.

Even when our man chooses to tone things down a little ("Diamonds/Mild Devotion To Majesty"), his signature is stamped onto the record as if branded by fire, showing off all the versatility of a performance that doesn't rule out a few precious shifts in mood or expression but always, invariably, tends to celebrate the light, in an irrepressible chamber-pop swirl. There's just a hint of a nod to the near-contemporary Wayne Coyne of "Yoshimi", just as the soliloquy of "One Man Show" occasionally winks at the young Bowie obsessed with astral mysteries, but for the rest, the unaffected emotions of this Barnum circus remain entirely Tim's own handiwork.

Horn, piano and flourishes of lyricism push "Suitcase Calling" towards sketching out a more ambitious pastoral, one that nonetheless only ever reaches completion in terms of atmosphere and technical skill. The whole squadron bends obediently to the demands of the script and the stylistic whims of its director, but when the aim isn't dazzling immediacy, the trick risks showing its seams, leaving on display only this vividly colourful, astonishing diving suit — a display of craftsmanlike bravura, scenically or choreographically speaking, that perhaps lacks only a soul, a deeper meaning beyond the virtuosity.

The symphonic carnival of Polyphonic Spree finds its symbolic fulfilment in the long, excessively catchy cantata "When The Fool Becomes A King", in effect the programmatic apotheosis of the big band's bloated philosophy and aesthetic, magnificent too in its musical-theatre exuberance, even with a DeLaughter now off the leash and without a muzzle. Take it or leave it, in short, since here the virtues and flaws of the whole carnival-wagon reach their most extreme point. If one absolutely must find a fault, it's impossible not to mention the heaviness evoked by the album's very title, which — combined with the considerable length of the individual tracks and the limited variety of expressive solutions — becomes a tangible reality as the minutes go by. This could indeed pose a serious problem for anyone who struggles with sounds of this kind, while fans of the genre run no particular risk of side effects, beyond a negligible, almost imperceptible undercurrent of boredom.

The two brief interludes — first and foremost the instrumental "Ensure Your Reservation", redolent of chamber music à-la Rachel's (the one behind "Selenography") — work precisely to break the momentum and purge, as far as possible, the dregs of this sugar binge, though whether their use actually pays off remains a matter of taste. The track that, right at the wire, lends its title to the collection is tasked with tying everything together, with a long instrumental open to contemplation, in the vein of the epic Morricone-esque echoes put forward by Mercury Rev on "Endlessly".

A band armed (with tenderness)

A triumphant year, crowned by the top spot on Billboard's Top Heatseekers chart, closes with the collective's performance at the ceremony for the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to Kenya's Wangari Maathai. By comparison, 2005 is almost one long sabbatical. Their only release that year is the soundtrack to Thumbsucker, the film by Mike Mills (merely a namesake of the Rem bassist), starring Tilda Swinton, Keanu Reeves and Vincent D'Onofrio. Originally entrusted to Elliott Smith, the job passes to the Texans after the songwriter's death, at the explicit request of the director (an admiring spectator at one of their shows).

The jaunty soundtrack leans on the candour of its own tone, setting aside the usual loud excesses. The scenery of "Skinny Dip" and "Scream And Shout" is deliberately pared down to the essentials, but gradually lit up by individual instruments (just the odd plucked string, a violin, a flute or the piano, scattered here and there) and by the most understated of choruses, where Tim's voice allows itself the pleasure of hide-and-seek. It's a rather shy work by the standards of the ensemble, one that plays by subtraction and relies more on impressions than actual songs, managing to hit the mark at times (thanks to the gentleness of "Move Away And Shine", for instance) but drifting openly into tedium with the rarefied wonder of "Acceptance", half an hour of seductive fingerpicking without the slightest variation on the theme.

Objectively better are the three tracks sung by Smith and still kept in the final program, from the covers of "Trouble" (Cat Stevens) and "Thirteen" (Big Star) to the previously unreleased "Let's Get Lost", which in the meantime ended up on the first posthumous collection, "From A Basement On The Hill".

Still somewhat transitional, the next release confirms the collective's rediscovered inspiration. It's a five-track EP, produced by the band together with star producers John Congleton and Jon Brion, released by Good in September 2006 as a clear appetiser for an even juicier full-length to come. Wait opens by previewing one of the tracks from the forthcoming album, "Mental Cabaret", here in a version perhaps less far-fetched but sufficiently eclectic, which nicely captures the transition from sophisticated chamber-pop to a sturdier, more ambitious pop-rock (also worth hearing is the elegant, nostalgic big ballad "I'm Calling", which pumps up the soft Lennon of "Milk And Honey" with extra muscle).

On "Love My Way", a cover of the Psychedelic Furs, Tim symbolically drags Tripping Daisy out of their grave — their joyously goofy streak — before doing so literally with the ecstatic, moved, flute-laced and essentially faithful rendition (just with a few extra trinkets) of "Sonic Bloom". What truly piques curiosity, though, is the sugary yet gutsy reinterpretation of the Nirvana track "Lithium", a fine case of stylistic appropriation amid assorted frivolity, booming choruses and the inevitable horn-section orgy: a solid calling card for a collection that, in its entirety (and in its own small way), proves to have real scope and the right drive.

The much-awaited third album, The Fragile Army, hits stores in July 2007, at a time when the band's contributions to soundtracks for independent films, TV series or programs, commercials, and even sports-club anthems (the one for the Dallas soccer team, for example) are multiplying. It's also the only occasion to hear, within this colourful jumble, the voice and guitars of twenty-five-year-old Annie Clark, who was making her solo debut around those same days with an album titled "Marry Me" under a moniker soon destined for very different success, St. Vincent. Her stint with the band is brief, but by no means a wasted experience for the formidable artist from Tulsa.

Having breathed life into the "strange animal" of Together We're Heavy, the new Polyphonic Spree shed the colourful robes of that exploit to don the unsettling black uniform of their army, whose Balilla-esque overtones are thankfully disavowed by the patches with hearts and red crosses, which convey the sense of "fragility" suggested by the title. Likewise, the ensemble's music begins blatantly drawing on that of other artists, with countless abstractions borrowed from mentor David Bowie or from a more playful, orchestral Flaming Lips with fewer artsy-conceptual pretensions. At least in terms of framing, once again, things pick up right where they left off.

The real kick-off, with the heavily-hyped single "Running Away", shows off a completely different rhythmic muscle and electric verve, forcefully pulling things straight back towards Tripping Daisy territory. The anomaly the band once represented thus seems largely reabsorbed, at least in good part, with the completion of this normalisation process that has led from the debut's naif mould to a more orthodox, disciplined kaleidoscope. It comes through clearly in the grooves of "Get Up And Go", where a histrionic Tim leads his bandmates through an alternative hornet's nest that has by now converted the original euphoria into a more conventional rock vehemence. Back come the hulking riffs of the Berggren era, this time wedded to the collective's usual circus eclecticism for an encounter celebrated, as ever, well over the top (the horns and choral scaffolding are at times dizzying).

On the returning "Mental Cabaret", the phantasmagoria of this army of musicians now looks towards a knowing, vaguely futuristic pop-rock, compelling for once in the way it flows free of cerebral digressions or ornamental frills. The title track, a melancholy ballad entrusted to the piano, slows the pace and closely recalls similar twilights by Sam Coomes of Almost, as well as the oddball playfulness of the much-mentioned Wayne Coyne. The result sounds perhaps a touch disjointed or scattered, but it's entertaining enough all the same. More than anything, the collective — a prisoner of its own strongly defined stylisations — has chosen to decisively change course just before the act could start showing its age, finding, in extremis, new and unexpected motivation. Still in the spirit of openly breaking free from the elegant decorativeness of its model, a "Younger Yesterday" thinned out by light strings and animated with less showmanship by a toned, sharply lucid DeLaughter in his eternal-dreamer explorations comes across as especially nimble and fresh. The other single ("We Crawl"), by contrast, aims partly to recover the original fairy-tale atmosphere, even while bulking up its sonic framework and tightening the songwriting to good effect in easy-listening terms.

The record favours spontaneity and candour while still aiming high in terms of melodies and arrangements, without losing itself in pompous posturing as a result. Speed and imagination let loose on a free rein help keep the listener's attention alert, as they now find valuable footing in songwriting of rare effectiveness, even allowing for the occasional freeze-dried flight of high-flown fancy. Sure, the galloping eccentricity remains a potential obstacle to reckon with, but the result comes across, as far as possible, as harmonious and rather pleasant; above all, it never flags in intensity and, almost right up to the end, keeps confirming its own curious nature, even in those episodes that most stubbornly hark back to the happy populism of their early work (the shameless refrain of "Watch Us Explode", for example). Before closing, as ever, in a festive free-for-all within yet another polyphonic orgy (nomen omen, then, truer than ever to their own name), the Americans allow themselves a slightly more minimal passage ("Light To Follow"), a precious, tartly psychedelic detour dressed up in electro-pop clothing with just the right balance, plus a somewhat verbose bout of solipsism for their unhinged bandleader ("Overblow Your Next"), proof that cramped stages don't seem to suit him.

The Last Bullets

At this point, after yet another tour trailing in David Bowie's wake, the band literally vanishes from the radar for five years, with just one offhand interlude - the single "Bullseye", released as a video app in the summer of 2011. During that same period, Tim was getting ready to promote his new musical creature. Starting back in 2009, DeLaughter had already begun recording tracks on his own computer, just to pin down a few ideas not destined for the Speekers' carousel. These sketches were actually turned into songs only when his friend Phil Karnats half-jokingly suggested cutting something together at his house in Chicago, inviting him over for a reunion of sorts - and the thing got more serious than expected. With the involvement of a few friends (Tim's wife and backing singer Julie Doyle, guitarist Dylan Silvers, and a couple of drummers) and a move into an actual recording studio, the new project Preteen Zenith was born. Rubble Guts And BB Eye, the first and (so far) only LP credited to the band, saw the light of day in May 2012 (released, inevitably, by the usual Good). What the newborn sextet offers is a kind of psychedelic infection, a flickering filter or a warped lens laid over little songs that, for the singer, are little more than business as usual, but which in their grubby, crumpled little outfits ("Maker", "Relief") don't displease at all. It's the first concrete attempt to resurrect the spirit, the almost magical aura, of Tripping Daisy - perhaps rendered futile by the fundamentally marginal nature of the operation, but honest enough in itself.

The single "Extraction", later left off the tracklist, already hints at the listless, none-too-convinced mood with a chloroformed space-rock, sourish but spineless, that in fact characterizes the album's most unhinged passages. With "Overcome" and "Life" the fragile pop spell of the more nostalgic DeLaughter returns, able to enchant in the odd occasional decadent flourish but incapable of fully convincing us of the soundness of his expressive intentions. The grain is overexposed, scorched by a sun that nonetheless doesn't seem capable of warming anything. A pale, willingly self-effacing frontman, even in the more animated moments, offers his easy-listening exercises in a slowed-down, phlegmatic version that lacks the contagious pyrotechnics of his other bands. The fascinations are there, but they remain little more than a mild diversion, and they don't satisfy the listener.

The meat on the fire evoked by "Meat" is scant, and seems to have gone past its expiry date: the mood is too subdued, with an excessive, out-of-place gloominess here and there weighing down otherwise interesting songs. Better the loopy, chant-like opener and a "Peddling" that, if nothing else, sounds inspired and doesn't come off too thin when set against the Beatles of "Magical Mystery Tour" or the White Album. And much better is the slightly livelier tenor, confidently leaning toward psych-pop, of the other single "Damage Control", featuring Erykah Badu, with its lo-fi grain, lysergic evocations, acoustic crystals and spontaneous à-la-Spiritualized symphonic flourishes. Rounding things off is an instrumental improvisation by Karnats and Wes Berggren from a VHS tape dating back to 1997, tacked on at the end as a tribute to their old partner in crime.

The autumn of 2012 marks the Polyphonic Spree's tentative return to action. On Halloween night, the cheerful troupe performs a one-off show at London's HMV Forum, a tribute concert honoring, with all due theatricality, the classics of "Rocky Horror Picture Show". An official bootleg of the event is recorded and later released by the usual Good Records as a double CD. Meanwhile, a fundraiser launched on Kickstarter hits its hundred-thousand-dollar target in under a month, allowing the troupe to record and release in time for the end-of-year holidays the collection Holidaydream: Sounds Of The Holidays Vol. One, which is exactly what the title suggests.

No point beating around the bush: the imagery conjured up by Christmas-themed songs really does seem to suit the Texan ensemble to a tee. Quite surprisingly, though, the band shows a will to hold back, imposing on itself a strict expressive diet. From the very start the mood is warm, ranging between extremely rarefied, almost narcotic yet evocative crooning ("Winter Wonderland") and martial little marches that happily border on the fairy-tale without ever slipping into mawkish caricature ("Carol Of The Drum"). The tone is homely and homemade, between whistling, jingling bells and a co-starring piano, but, aside from that, this hardly feels like a set of Christmas classics (a telling case being the elusive, instrumental rereading of "It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year"), save for a few very famous exceptions (the dutiful, warm cover of "Happy Xmas - War Is Over").

In the intimacy and tenderness of a duet with his son Felix ("White Christmas"), as much as in the encounter dense with wonder and unease alongside friends School Of Seven Bells on "Silver Bells", Tim seems genuinely inspired and, more importantly, refrains from hamming it up as one might easily have expected, limiting himself instead to acting as a guide through a parallel musical universe that lives by its own rules but also sounds much more shadowy and far less saccharine than the pre-release expectations suggested.

The real Polyphonic Spree can only rarely be glimpsed, toward the end, in the reprise of "Silver Bells" or in a "It's Christmas" that could easily pass for a syrupy outtake from The Fragile Army. The ground was slippery, then, but the result, however unusually restrained, comes off rather brilliant, not mildly self-celebratory and, all things considered, not at all predictable. Curiously, the band believes quite strongly in this release, and to promote it they put together amateur videoclips for every track on the album, later published through a specially created YouTube channel.

The time is ripe for a grander comeback, even if the chance of a full-blown rentrée has effectively been squandered by these recent minor releases. Produced once again by Eric Drew Feldman alongside the DeLaughter couple, and released through the usual Good (in North America) and Cherry Red (in Europe), the new Yes, It's True arrives amid the dead calm of August 2013 with a certain dose of fizz but without the jolt needed to reverse an otherwise unfavorable momentum.

As usual, the opening is thunderous and full-bodied, stuffed with flutes, trumpets and horns for the inevitable candy-coated blasts. And in the opening moments the formula doesn't seem to undergo any notable changes: sugary melodies prevail, pumped up rhythmically, with more than one echo of the singer's old outfit. Despite a near-restrained imprint, at least by his standards, the frontman remains the undisputed star of the show, the usual grand master of ceremonies, while in the background one can appreciate a tipsy yet disciplined atmosphere. The vocal choral element appears far more limited than in previous instalments, a sign that the twenty American musicians intended to craft a work more played than recited compared to the past.

The propulsive force and the surprise factor of Polyphonic Spree have long since run dry, and this new effort stands, more than anything, as testimony to a simulacrum still beautiful and colorful but undeniably worn down by the tired rehashing of so many of its clichés. Having shelved the clever gospel formulas of the early albums, the band seeks to make up for the lack of an equally solid formal structure with the collective's enthusiasm, with the dazzling effect of its blazing colors and dynamism. Decent in this regard is a lush episode like "Popular By Design", enriched by a kind of ersatz tribalism, between exotic echoes and joyous refrains, in which the sizable Dallas platoon ends up resembling a bit too closely its most recent followers, the New Zealanders BARB - though in the mocking position of one forced to chase after having long set the pace themselves. Pleasant, precise, enveloping, but not as explosive as one might rightly have expected: the album boasts a few decent moments along with a DeLaughter on fine form, although the underlying bitterness and the search for a more mature take seem at odds with the usual fairy-tale bulimia of the production and arrangements. Spared such a penalty is the hammy "Heart Talk", the most anomalous, unpredictable and sincere passage of the bunch, the least stiff, with its booze-soaked horns, its rickety piano and a particularly electric performance from the bandleader, in the manner of late-1980s Robert Smith.

On "Carefully Try", Tim once again tries to leave his mark through his singing, full of melancholy wonder. Although properly backed by a band finally devoted to the role of frame and accompaniment, there remains here too an impression of excessive ballast, of intoxicating pomposity. Elsewhere ("What Would You Do?") one is reminded of the euphoric Tripping Daisy of the masterpiece Jesus Hits Like The Atom Bomb, but with the gleaming chrome guitars of back then drowned in a festive yet sterile drizzle of keyboards and percussion. The return to communal soul emphasis grows shameless within the folds of "Blurry Up The Lines", without hyperglycemic excess and indeed with an obliquely psychedelic aftertaste: hardly a passage worth tearing one's clothes over, though, just a dutiful little exercise put together to please the diehard fans. Still better than the muddled "Let Them Be", with its coarse, cartoonish gait that never really takes off, or the insubstantial refrain to which "Raise Your Head" is reduced, whose array of showy effects remains among the few points of interest on a second side marked by an evident creative retreat.

Yes, It's True recycles, in short, a few sound tricks from DeLaughter's past and draws strength from the commendable intent to move beyond the "operatic" register that Polyphonic Spree had accustomed us to. Unfortunately, though, much like the debut of Tim's other creature a year earlier, the album ends up running aground despite its good intentions, unsure of where it wants to go and how to give shape to its many ideas in store (only some of which are truly worthwhile). A bit like trying to get a pachyderm decked out in sequins and paillettes to dance, the effect perhaps tips too far into the grotesque. The exact opposite happens on the closing "Battlefield" where, in a desperate search for lightness, the bandleader works his magic with his unmistakable sour-sweet voice, backed by little more than piano. Like a languid, nocturnal crooner, old Tim hits the mark precisely when he's not trying to dazzle at all costs.

As this last little chapter reveals (or the pointless remix album released by Kirtland a year later, Psychphonic), a drastic expressive diet would have suited him and his many travelling companions rather well. Twenty-one members at present, well over eighty if you count everyone who, over little more than fifteen years, has passed through the ranks of the sprawling ensemble even just for brief stints - with Okkervil River's Michael St.Clair, Jason Garner of Paper Chase and Rick Nelson (Twilight Singers, Afghan Whigs) - not to mention Annie Clark, of course - among the less obscure names.

These are Polyphonic Spree, whose last major appearance remains the New Year's Eve concert of 2015 at Victory Park, in their hometown of Dallas - winter ponchos as uniform - in front of forty thousand people. For a cunning collective that trades in choral, symphonic pop, perhaps the ideal lemon has already been squeezed more than enough, but from the volcanic Tim DeLaughter one always feels entitled to expect some new theatrical twist, so never say never. It's no coincidence that recent news, from early 2017, reveals that our man has decided to thaw out Tripping Daisy after eighteen years - or rather, what's left of them, net of the departures of Wes Berggren and Ben Curtis: still present and accounted for are Mark Pirro's bass, Bryan Wakeland's drums and Phil Karnats' guitar, alongside that shrill little voice that almost used to parody Ozzy Osbourne.

A film we've already seen, but who knows, it might just work...

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