Dance Hall At Louse Point - John Parish/Polly Jean Harvey

The very fact that Dance Hall at Louse Point (which was released in 1996) has been listed on Ciao since 2003 and yet this is the first review is indicative of this way that this album was released, promoted and received. It was released just as PJ Harvey was riding the crest of the wave of success of the album 'To Bring You My Love', but it seemed to go almost unnoticed, perhaps because top bill went to John Parish (who wrote and played the music, ...
...live tour), I have re-discovered Dance Hall at Louse Point and thoroughly enjoyed doing so.

==PJ Harvey==
PJ (Polly Jean) Harvey released her first album, Dry, 17 years ago (1992) to critical acclaim. She has been likened to Patti Smith. True, she shares with Patti the poetic lyrics, the strong, deep vocals, the longevity and I dare say that Polly has been influenced by the punk movement of which Patti was so much a part. I ... more

The very fact that Dance Hall at Louse Point (which was released in 1996) has been listed on Ciao since 2003 and yet this is the first review is indicative of this way that this album was released, promoted and received. It was released just as PJ Harvey was riding the crest of the wave of success of the album 'To Bring You My Love', but it seemed to go almost unnoticed, perhaps because top bill went to John Parish (who wrote and played the music, whilst PJ Harvey wrote the lyrics and sang vocals) and she was listed as Polly Jean Harvey rather than the usual PJ Harvey we know and love her as. Critics saw it as an art experiment, reviews of it are mixed, but to me it retains that bluesy rock sound that we know PJ Harvey for and is a beautiful and oddly crafted album of dark moods, angular guitar and percussion and an array of vocal styles that surprise, entertain and disturb.

As John Parish and PJ Harvey prepare to release a new collaborative album (release date in March 2009, to be followed by a live tour), I have re-discovered Dance Hall at Louse Point and thoroughly enjoyed doing so.

PJ Harvey

PJ (Polly Jean) Harvey released her first album, Dry, 17 years ago (1992) to critical acclaim. She has been likened to Patti Smith. True, she shares with Patti the poetic lyrics, the strong, deep vocals, the longevity and I dare say that Polly has been influenced by the punk movement of which Patti was so much a part. I think she has a similar attitude to Tori Amos - she's upfront, not afraid to play with those images of sexuality, femininity and ambiguity.

Along this journey, Polly has demonstrated her keen musicianship, playing many of the instruments on each of her albums, and mastering the piano for White Chalk, her last album release. She has collaborated with many other artists, including Josh from Queen's of the Stone Age under the Desert Sessions project, which is another stunning album. She has also demonstrated her versatility having done some acting and published her poetry.

PJ Harvey has a strong fan base, but has never really been mainstream. I admire the fact that she continually pushes herself, trying different sounds, styles, instruments and collaborative partners. How else can you enjoy such longevity and long standing respect.

Over her career she has won 1 Mercury Prize (2001), 7 Brit Award nominations, 5 Grammie nominations and has appeared in several magazine best artist and best album compilations.

John Parish

PJ Harvey had played in John Parish's band as a teenager in Dorset and he worked with her on To Bring You My Love, the album released just before Dancehall at Louse Point, on which he served as co-producer, guitarist, percussionist and keyboard player.

PJ Harvey told NME 'I know John can write demanding and intellectual music, much more than mine, which is very simple' and explained that she wanted to be able to concentrate on the lyrics. Her view of the album is that it was a major turning point for her in terms of the development of her lyric and song writing.

The Music

The brief intro track, Girl, sets the scene for the album that follows. A high pitched, thin vocal (just ah's - no lyrics) is accompanied by eerie and dark guitar. This is like the soundtrack to a very spooky film.

Rope Bridge Crossing is all jagged layered guitar and snare drums. The spoken word verses are like being told a secret story - you are being drawn into her world and her confidence. The chorus takes you on a hurtling run with vocals reminiscent of the attitude PJ Harvey first displayed in Dry.

City of No Sun is almost hard to listen to. The vocals move from a slow, quiet, ambient verse, backed only by fast strum of just two chords on a solitary guitar, into a banshee screech of a chorus, with accelerating and layered guitar. Both the content and the delivery are dark and brooding.

That Was My Veil was a single from the album and lifts the mood at this point. It has a beautiful melody accompanied by acoustic guitar which builds into use of a slide guitar in the chorus and an organ in the Middle 8. The vocal style is soft and lyrical, the words poetic:
No words can heal my heart
Inside I'm broken, now it's done
Was she a pretty girl

Urn With Dead Flowers in a Drained Pool has a really rocky chorus, but this is still not music you can dance to. The overall mood is anger, the structure of the song quite complex, and the vocal styles varied, encompassing spoken word, a vocal line that sound a bit like sung poetry and a high pitched rocky thrash of a chorus. Experimental art rock is how I'd describe this track.

Civil War Correspondent has a really beautiful sound to it, the guitar and organ is incredibly atmospheric. PJ Harvey sings a hushed verse, but this builds into a deep, sombre chorus where she sounds incredibly like Iggy Pop:
I shout but he don't hear
I put down on a page
Darling spare me your tears
Just send me the light of day

Taut is my favourite track on this album. It opens with the spookiest refrain, which really does sound like the soundtrack to a scary film, but then the guitar kicks in and, much like Sonic Youth (probably my all time favourite band), it is fast and discordant, the percussion making this really edgy listening. The spoken word verses are reminiscent of Kim Gordon's, but her furious whisper is almost disturbing. The chorus is like an island of melody amongst a sea of furious musical noise. 'Jesus save me'. I've never heard anything like this before or since.

Un Cercle Autour du Soleil is a slower number, still guitar and unusual percussion giving it an almost oriental sound. The lyrics are not in French, as the title suggests, but they are as ominous:
No more
Laughter
Since the
Black come

Time here
Lingers
Trace with
My finger

Heela is approaching a more conventional blues/rock song with slide guitars, but with its chanting chorus, it is not as strong or as interesting as many of the other tracks on the album.

Is That All There Is is a cover of a Peggy Lee song. I haven't heard the original, so it's hard for me to comment, but the song fits in with the rest of the album in that the verses are spoken word, telling the stories of childhood memories of extraordinary experiences, but with something missing - is that all there is?

Dance Hall at Louse Point is an instrumental, ironically, as it is the title track and the lack of vocals means that PJ Harvey wasn't involved in it. It's great, though, and shows what John Parish is really good at - wild percussion, unusual arrangements and quirky discordant guitars, all of which keep you guessing and make for interesting listening.

The brief closing track, Lost Fun Zone, has a mono and quiet guitar riff, which means that the vocal track is absolutely in the foreground, until the chorus kicks in and the full force of the layers of music are felt. An unusual arrangement, it leaves you with a clear imprint of this unusual, adventurous album.

Conclusion

Well, yes, I am a PJ Harvey fan. This is the 3rd album of hers that I have reviewed on Ciao out of a total of 7 album reviews, which I think shows how easy it is to write about her music - it is so varied and so interesting. The reason I like this album is the reason I like her as an artist, it is daring, unusual, evocative, brooding.

There is a lot in the way of unusual arrangements and structure in this album and such a wide variety of vocal styles that it's almost as if it was her way of trying things out to see what effect they had. As with all experiments, this does not make for a very commercially successful sound, or for very wide appeal, but to hell with that, I say. Music is far too much about the money these days, and not enough about the music!

So, I would recommend this album to others, however, it would be a guarded recommendation.

If you have not listened to PJ Harvey before, this is probably not the best album to start with (better to go for To Bring You My Love or Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea).

If you know and have enjoyed PJ Harvey and have not heard this album, then I would recommend giving it a go. My copy from Amazon cost £4.98, what a bargain.

 

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