CURSE

Just like its predecessor Brighter Now, Curse is a cassette release that´s been slightly expanded in order to fill out an LP. The opening song (Love Puppets) is the archetypal LPD song, the blueprint for dozens of songs that Edward Ka-Spel would fill both LPD albums and solo releases with over the next 25 years. It's difficult to describe unless you've heard one of these songs (Black Zone, Casting the Runes, I Love You In Your Tragic Beauty or Damien, just to name a few). There's always a chord or two that sound just a little bit out of place, creating a certain tension and adding a sinister dimension to an otherwise rather conventional arrangement. There's also the dramatic, almost over-serious delivery - sometimes mistaken as arrogance - that is such a big part of the band's charm. Love Puppets is built just around a synthesizer arpreggio with the occasional guitar chord, the dymanics consisting only of Edward raising his voice and - at one point - opening one of the filters of his synth to great effect. Or perhaps it was the Silverman's synth? Anyway, the album has its ups and downs. Wall Purger's Night sounds like a throwaway track from an earlier cassette (which - if my memory serves - it was) but from there's it's...all over the place! Some tracks treads Syd Barrett/early T-Rex territory (Waving at the Areoplanes, Lisa's Party, Doll's House), and does so very well. Arzhklahh Olgevezh! is a bizarre disco number in Ka- Spel's very own tongue, which does sound a bit too self-conciousy excentric to be really fun. The high point of Curse is the closing Stoned Obituary with it's chanted finale with churchbells and its repeated unfinished sentence, Die with your eyes on.... Stayed in my head for days the first time I heard it. All in all, Curse is very good album, my only remark being the primitive production and the lack of a proper rhythm section (which some tracks here really call for). Like most early LPD material, it propably appeals more to psych fans than to progheads, and with this album it becomes evident that the band's songs were becoming stronger than its instrumental muscle. Still, Curse is not the best introduction to this many-facetted band, but it's nowhere near a diehards-only release.