Review by LarryG
3 stars out of 4
Mark Linkous, the leader of Sparklehorse, is one of the most interesting
figures in rock music. After touring to support his first record,
Vivadixiesubmarinetransmissionplot, Linkous nearly died of a drug overdose
and was in the hospital for three months. Good
Morning Spider reflects
he turmoil of that experience. However, the surreal nature of
much of Good Morning Spider, can't be attributed just to his recent
experience. Linkous was pretty weird to start with. If anything,
the new record is slightly more mainstream than the first. Good Morning
Spider is a sprawling, frustrating, compelling, strange and sometimes
brilliant work that takes all kinds of twists and turns. It starts with
Pig, an Nine Inch Nails style electric guitar assault, then turns 180
degrees to the very subdued Painbirds, which has an anesthetized feel,
and the stark Saint Mary, where Linkous sings in an even weaker voice
for a nurse to blanket him and keep him from burning, accompanied
almost exclusively by a very spare acoustic guitar. Linkous has the
ability to create a pop hook or a fairly straight rock song as he showed
on the first record's Someday I Will Treat You Good and Rainmaker.
Sick of Goodbyes is a very catchy rock song with a nice easy feeling.
Maria's Little Elbow is an easy folk rocker where Linkous sings about a
lonely friend. Ghost of His Smile is a fun rocker edged with a cheesy
synthesizer. But Linkous seems bored with a straight rock song. He likes
to mess with the songs by doing things like filtering his voice on songs
like the hard rocker Cruel Sun. Sunshine is a nice, quiet song that
refers to having a past washed away but as it nears the end, the music
distorts as if played on a warped record. Happy Man seems to be a great
rock song but Linkous obscures it by simulating the effect of a poorly
tuned radio, adding a layer of static to nearly the entire song. Good
Morning, Spider has a number of very personal, surreal introspective
ballads, often delivered in a weak voice, as if sung from a hospital bed.
It's filled with images of heaven and mortality. Much of the dreamy Come
On In is a child like invocation of "now I lay me down to sleep, I
pray my the Lord my soul to keep", as if Linkous had been prepared
to die. Good Morning, Spider is a fascinating work by an idiosyncratic
artist who has obviously been effected by a very traumatic experience
and luckily is still around to tell about it on Good Morning, Spider.
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