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Whatever And Ever Amen
03/18/1997 3:00 AM, Yahoo! Music
Ken Barnes
I'll admit it. I suffer from pianophobia. The symptoms? Living in a non-ivory tower (unlike most rock critics) in mortal dread of
Billy Joel and Tapestry-era
Carole King; fearing the more florid and hyperkinetic excesses of
Elton John and the Scientology-fueled abstractions of
Bowie key-tinkler
Mike Garson; panicking in the preciosities of
Andy Pratt and
Dean Friedman (not to mention
Todd Rundgren barking up the wrong twee); and wishing the worst of
Nilsson,
Laura Nyro (God rest their solos) and a thousand sensitive imitators in the Steinway-saturated '70s would just go away. So
Ben Folds Five alarmed me: press clippings led me to believe their influences stemmed from that deadly decade and nothing I'd heard dissuaded me from the notion that this was a group that would give me the howling fantods. But I was way out of tune on this one. First, I had to like any band whose album art featured the crossed-thumbs, double-flying-V international sign for "whatever" (although the one-handed, three-fingered, two-phased [W-E] sequential sign is probably cooler, if impossible to represent without expensive 3D technology). Then the "recording notes" proved to be deadpan gutbuster. And then the record turned out to be a stunner. Actually, the normally unerring sample-selection process myLAUNCH employs to choose this review's accompanying soundbites, doesn't come close to doing this album justice, since by some mischance two of the three tracks selected are odds-on the album's least impressive. "Kate" is a limpish, lightweight love-letter novelty and "One Angry Dwarf And Two Hundred Solemn Faces" is frenetic and witty enough, but it's exactly the kind of smart-ass revenge-of-the-nerd-type number that could get this trio typecast. The glorious alterna-world already has more than enough barely-post-adolescent wank-offs than anyone could possibly need (think
Ween and
Weezer and a dozen other bands whose names start with "W"). Which would be tragic, because there's so much more to BFF than mere wisecrackery. Not that their abundant wit isn't effective, especially when married to a terrific tune, as in the first single, "Battle Of Who Could Care Less" or "Song For The Dumped," an anthem for the lovelorn that's a direct descendant of the old Nilsson song that goes something like "You're breaking my heart/You're tearing it apart/So fuck you." (The Folds version goes "Well, fuck you too/Give me my money back [repeat]/You bitch." It has a nifty piano break, to boot.) Dumping and getting dumped represent the "emotional core" of the album--songs like "Fair," "Brick," "Selfless, Cold & Composed" and "Smoke" explore the topic from a number of angles. "Brick" and "Smoke" do so in such heartbreakingly gorgeous fashion that you wonder why they even bother with snide piffle like "Angry Dwarf" and the wry but lightweight "Steven's Last Night In Town." They probably need a bit of comic relief, though, and you might, too, after the stunning pair of closing numbers, the melancholy,
Brian Wilson-esque "Missing The War" and the bleak and lovely "Evaporated." This perhaps justifies the album's "hidden track" which goes something like "Look, I got your hidden track right here, pal. Ben Folds is a fuckin' asshole." At his worst, he can be. But at his best (most of this album), he's made piano-based pop-rock worthwhile again. This album may not single-handedly cure pianophobia, but it's 12 big steps toward recovery.
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