Shell Company – I Am Not I Am
Arthur Rimbaud, the teenage rockstar poet who faked his own death before actually succumbing to an infection while selling guns in Africa, famously said “Je est un autre.” Our inner self is always on the move, and we never get close enough to it to make its acquaintance, learn its secrets, and learn who we really are.
Rock musicians who experiment so often and powerfully on their psyche should know this better than most. They are not what they show. And, thus they can’t be judged on the body that they carry around with them or on their opinions which, naturally, will change. Ironically, musicians make songs so that the world will get to understand them, but the musicians themselves are on a similar quest.
Shell Company’s “I Am Not I Am” is a kind of desperate, poetic pop-rock song. Its structure is particularly interesting. Shell Company attempt to write an all-out radio single. While popularity with radio programming may still be achieved, this is nothing like the bland pop groups it tries to imitate. It’s far more interesting. It’s a tune that grows slowly, complete with vocals that seem to be shouted from outside the recording booth and with a pummelling intensity that keeps growing until the very end.
Mope. – Wanderer.
The music business didn’t just lose out because people stopped buying records, because they embraced streaming, or because they opted to spend their time playing video games instead. Sure, those things didn’t help the yearly returns.
The biggest problem was that the people in charge of the record labels, no matter how much of a head start they had over everyone else, were always small-timers. They always thought about short-term gains. And, they always panicked when they couldn’t get ‘em.
In the long run, the music biz stalled because the most talented people who would’ve worked in it found their way outside of the system. The smartest songwriters took their gifts elsewhere. They either established other careers or decided to self-produce and promote their songs. The biz didn’t notice, but they lost access to those who could’ve saved it.
It’s remarkable, even now, to consider that Mope.’s “Wanderer.” was, most likely, recorded in someone’s kitchen. It’s remarkable to realize that such songwriters and daring musicians are still around and that they’re not owned a check by the major record labels. That’s because “Wanderer.” is more compelling than nearly anything you may encounter on commercial radio today and because, in all of its lo-fi glory, it’s still a very well-put-together sound. The truth is out there, and it’s being blasted over the internet from artist’s kitchens everywhere. And these artists have stayed free.