Sparks' new album MAD! will make you want to put on your most Baroque outfit and play the synthesizer
A review of Sparks’ 28th studio album, MAD! The duo are back, and better than ever. Each song is so ornate that it feels like a miniature movie or theatrical production.
I think every artist should listen to Sparks, irrespective of your discipline, as it will inevitably trigger within you a desire to be creative, to experience the euphoria of creating, and also to remind you to preserve the fun of the process. There are few artists that can do what Sparks do, at the scale at which they do it; as with each new album, they both expand upon and deepen the kitsch creativity and sparkling imagination that makes their music so special.
I saw a description of the Sparks that summed them up perfectly: “If the world is a cafe, its ridiculous patrons babbling ridiculously all day long, then Ron Mael is the guy on his own in the corner that you don't notice, quietly sipping his coffee. But he's watching, listening, making notes”.
MAD! is the duo’s 28th studio album; opening with Do Things My Own Way (a single that was released earlier this year), an electro pop song which very much sets the tone for the album.
We then descend into the playful, whimsical JanSport Backpack, a melodramatic song about being mistreated by a lover, which shimmers with crystalline synths, the heartbroken laments made hilarious by being followed by lyrics such as “JanSport Backpack/She wears a JanSport Backpack” or “You’re turning slow/ Strap on your pack/Now fully turned/ I feel a hint/ I will be burned” and “Oh why, I try my best every day/Oh why, oh why, oh why, please put your JanSport away”.
One of my favorite songs from the album is Running Up A Tab At The Hotel For The Fab, which opens with the most dramatic distorted synth section I have ever heard, with a Western style bass slowly entering (the kind that plays when the outlaw cowboy appears in a Western, the camera panning from the cowboy boots up, in a swirl of desert dust, to reveal the rugged badboy). For some reason, I envision this song taking place in the hotel that the 1990 movie The Witches was set in. It makes me want to put on a 1970s-style headscarf, paired with my most glamorous outfit, go to a hotel, and pretend to be someone else.
My Devotion is sublime, dreamy chamber pop; it feels like you can hear plumes of face powder bursting off the synths like sugar. The subject matter is a bit darker than the sonic world it inhabits, as it is about feral fandoms and blind nationalism “My devotion to you / Is ‘bout all that I do/Got your name written on my shoe/And I’m thinkin’ of gettin’ a tattoo”.
Don’t Dog It sounds like the opening of a 90s cartoon that takes place in a wacky zany cartoon world where the buildings curve and bend as they reach towards the sky; “I asked the man/ I asked the holy man/ Your holiness, show me some guiding light/He sat there mum, in quiet contemplation/Suddenly he rose, “My advice…”
Don’t Dog It
Don’t Dog It
Don’t Dog It
It’s Judgement Day
Don’t Dog It
Don’t Dog It
Don’t Dog it
Now step away
In Daylight is divine; the way the electronic soundscape is designed reminds me of desert plains, it invokes the same feeling that a lot of the best early 00s electronic music invoked. The most intense song on is I-405, which swings from cinematic to wildly theatrical, like a chase scene throughout Victorian London.
A Long Red Light opens with a dissonant electronic synth sequence, paired with a string section; it is deeply uneasy, this could very well be the opening music of a 1980s horror movie, where something very dark is about to go down on a nighttime drive. As the song progresses, some eerie new synths poke through like the artificial neon glow of lights in the night sky, that signify an alien invasion a la The X-Files.
Drowned in A Sea of Tears has the vibe of a musical, the rich chord progression in this reflects the deep and sincere melancholy pulsing throughout this, opening with the lyrics “I didn’t know how deep it all must have been/Her greatest talent, she could keep it all in/Whatever bothered her, I had no idea/Or how big of a deal, or her lengths to conceal”. This song does not have a punchline, it is deeply moving, about not being able to help someone you care about, who is right next to you, but still, somehow, unreachable. The string section in this reflects the all-encompassing feeling of keeping emotions walled in, like a dam in the middle of the ocean.
I knew A Little Bit Of Light Banter was going to be a romp; “Just a little bit of light banter/ And then we say good night/ With a little bit of light banter/And then we turn off the light”.
It all comes to an end with “Lord Have Mercy”, this opens with a synthpop vibe, and descends into a sound that reminds me of The Beatles, the album drawing to a conclusion with the lyrics “Lord Have Mercy/Calm angry seas/ Blow gentle breezes/ Toward you and me, toward you and me”.
I am constantly blown away by not only the lyrical genius of Sparks; but by how the soundscapes behind the lyrics have such a strong visual element, they feel almost like miniature movies or theatre plays, and that the soundscapes of each song invoke such different imagery; a testament to the sheer artistic skill of Sparks.
MAD! is art in the truest sense; it will make you want to put on your most opulent, baroque outfit and play the synthesizer.
Listen or purchase here
About Eimear O Sullivan
Eimear Ann O Sullivan is a multi-genre music producer, audio engineer and vocalist. After receiving a Masters in Music Technology from the CIT Cork School of Music, she went on to operate as a producer under the name Blakkheart. Her releases have received critical acclaim from Ireland's biggest music publications, such as District Magazine and Nialler9, alongside receiving heavy commercial radio airplay. She currently works in Cork recording studio Flashpoint CC. Previous clients of hers include the likes of Comedy Central’s Dragony Aunt star Candy Warhol, rapper Darce and Outsider YP. (Photo credit @Fabian Boros)
Contact Eimear O Sullivan at eimear.o.sullivan@musicngear.com
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