New Town (album)

New Town is the twenty-seventh album by Jandek, and his only release of (1998). Corwood Industries release #0765, it finds him returning to solo voice and (mostly) guitar.

1 Overview
2 Track listing
3 Album cover description
4 Reviews
5 External links

[edit] Overview

After the diversion of I Woke Up, New Town returns to the voice and acoustic stylings more common to the "second acoustic phase" of Jandek. And yet, this is his most distant, harrowing disc in a while. The first four albums in this phase had a somewhat warmer sound - an often strummed guitar tuned to a slightly more "Western" style. This sound appears on the title track, which appears to address a woman who has moved to a "new town." He starts the song by saying "I thought I would send you/ the last song I wrote" before reaching a more chilling conclusion: "Just look around/you're living in the new town/all the faces seem like they're underground." Turns out they now seem to live in the same area, as the song twists to, "Just because you’re near me/let’s pretend there’s a good chance/yes and then we’ll try romance/it’s not the same as it was before." So maybe she moved into town to try and revive something? Hard to say, but this is easily the warmest song on an album that quickly turns cold.

There's some blues on "Steal Away Home," but for the most part these songs don't fall into any particular genre. They're all picked to a steady 4/4 tempo (or something close to it), while the singer appears to suffer for his desire to love and his belief in God, a piety that feels, remarkably, hopeless. God may be great, but He's distant and unavailable. The lover is addressed in "The Real You" ("When I was nine/I wanted a real gun/they gave me an air gun/when I was 25/I wanted you/you gave me a stone") and the distance becomes even greater.

That's not anything that's going to change, and the music around these lyrics is every bit as bleak. There is some diversity - the harmonica is still around, "Time Will Come" marks the return of the bucket/percussion instrument from I Woke Up, and what sounds like an accordion shows back up on "Look At It." That song includes lyrics that seem to doubt an afterlife (I just wanted to be real/and if this life ends soon/I'm done/crush crush crush crush") and notes that "she always looks at me so strange." The album ends with a song that begins by re-asking the questions that have driven the album ("what am I supposed to be/what does it mean that I'm living/what will it mean when I die"), and then seems to direct itself at the listener. "no matter who you are there/you must get the point/I came to ask you/just who you think you are." Are you "real" (a major point to the record), do you love someone, where will you go when you die? Answers may be addressed to Corwood's PO box.

[edit] Track listing

"New Town" – 4:14
"Steal Away Home" – 4:31
"Street Walk" – 3:45
"You Standing There" – 3:27
"Desert Voice" – 4:36
"Let Me Hear the Words You Say" – 3:24
"The Real You" – 2:27
"It Would Only Be Action" – 4:10
"Look At It" – 3:36
"Time Will Come" – 2:50
"What You Are" – 3:46

[edit] Album cover description

The strange coloring evokes Ready for the House, though the cover is nearly identical to Interstellar Discussion. The "grandma's kitchen" drum throne is back, but the snare (missing from Discussion) makes another appearance. The hi-hat is again on the left.

As always, there are curtains drawn.

[edit] Reviews

...in his ‘usual’ style, although the lyrics now seem more personal than simply depressed. A couple of exceptions to the vibe this time: the jagged instrumental ‘Street Walk’, and what sounds like Jandek pounding on the back of his guitar while singing and playing harmonica on ‘Time Will Come’. -- Piero Scaruffi The History of Rock Music Vol. 4