MAN MAN - Life Fantastic

Normalization complete.

After chaotic, irreverent and ironic beginnings in the vein of Zappa, Waits and Captain Beefheart, with “Life Fantastic” Man Man arrive at a relatively more restrained style of songwriting, one might even say (with all due caution!) almost “pop.” It's still a blast with the Philadelphia band, as if you'd stumbled into a riotously colourful, slightly drunken party, though there's no shortage of more intimate moments (the limping, aching “Steak Knives,” the poignant interlude of “Oh, La Brea”) or at least less forbidding ones (the title-track).

The title, essentially, is a sarcastic way of saying that life must be accepted for what it is, tragedies included. In fact, this is a record - to paraphrase the words of frontman, singer and keyboardist Ryan "Honus Honus" Kattner - fuelled by broken relationships, the death of friends, aimless wandering. As if something were missing; as if that something could never be attained... And so the band moves through territory that's certainly less adventurous than in the past, but still enticing, with structures that seem to bare their own fragility and an “essential” disorder that makes no secret of its existence. But if there's still fun to be had, let's have it this time without too much beating around the bush, picturing ourselves in the Sixties at the court of the man from Cucamonga (“Piranhas Club”), with effervescent fanfares worthy of Goran Bregovic (“Dark Arts”), rockier numbers (“Shameless”), clear (or not so clear) echoes of “Swordfishtrombones” (“Haute Tropique,” “Spooky Jookie,” “Bangkok Necktie”) and so on.

In any case, if you really want to hear them at their best, it's worth digging back into “The Man In A Blue Turban With A Face” and “Six Demon Bag.”

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11/05/2011