Artist: BADLY DRAWN BOY
Album: HOUR OF BEWILDERBEAST
Label: Beggars Banquet
Released: 2000
My favorite album of 2000 is one of those strange works of art that people seem to like to argue about more than enjoy. (Call it the Eminem Principle.) Ever since Damon Gough, a.k.a. Badly Drawn Boy, won Britain's Mercury Music Prize, a sort of Turner Prize for current music, last summer, the press has been awash in reviews either slavishly praising the album or, more often, puncturing the hype. Gough's strange, self-absorbed live debut in NYC a couple of months ago drew an even larger number of slams from the press and hipoisie. As if this weren't enough, the guy has, Moby-like, already allowed commerce to sully his art: Gap licensed his track "Everybody's Stalking" for a recent TV ad for winter-wear. With no top 40 hits or Grammy awards, this is the kind of "controversy" that urban media types who are already bored with 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' or think the whole world watches Charlie Rose live for.
But the album, IMHO, is the real deal: a Nick Drake-an song cycle bursting with gorgeous melodies, clever studio craft, polished arrangements, and introspective lyrics. Unwilling to be pigeonholed as a pure Navel Gazing Folkie, Gough spikes the album with bouncy keyboards and other quirky sounds that give the record a bit of a kitchen-sink feel. Gough does have one of those mannered British pretty-rock voices (Morrissey haters might want to avoid), but he's playing up the singerly aspect of his voice, not the mopey end, and that makes all the difference. To be fair, BDB may have shot his wad, melody-wise, with this album; if that aforementioned live gig is any indication, he may well be primed to self-destruct from all the hype. No matter: 'The Hour of Bewilderbeast' is that rare thing, an album that arrives fully formed, envelops you on the first listen and surprisingly doesn't grow tired on the 20th listen.
It could end up an 'Invisible Man' (unrepeatable genius) or might well be a 'Portrait of the Artist' (great work presaging masterpieces to come); time will tell.
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