They are like cool uncles, world-weary and occasionally given to outbursts that embarrass your mother, bearing souvenirs from their travels and the idea that you, too, could someday break free. (For further expansion on this theme, see: “Born to a Family.”) This is a very nice Go-Betweens album, not an astonishing one. But that’s quite enough for the fans who know that when Grant lends his warm strum to something of Robert’s, when Robert turns his arch eye on something of Grant’s, it’s always worth hearing. Example: the bitterly nostalgic “Darlinghurst Nights,” which is probably the only song ever to name-check Aussie critic Frank Brunetti, perhaps because no one else would dare apply the obvious rhyme, spaghetti. When the Go-Betweens do it, it’s poetry, not doggerel. What can I say? They have rare gifts. -Kim Cooper
- "Darlinghurst Nights"
- "Born to a Family"
1 comment:
I have a hard time assessing G-Bs albums for the first month or so. For instance, I thought Liberty Belle was one of their trifling albums on first listen, but now I hear a towering achievement. William Ham (another LITG contributor) has a theory that G-Bs albums tick-tock between greatness and relative mediocrity with each successive release, which would put Oceans Apart on the mediocre side of the scale. I think that he's more-or-less right up to now (excepting the phenomenal-good Spring Hill Fair), but this one may also be an exception. I'll let you know in a month.
In other news, the G-Bs are touring the US for the first time since 1989 in June, hitting NYC, Chapel Hill, Chicago, Seattle, San Francisco, and LA. Unfortunately for me, none of these places is within a day's drive of Austin, and my budget doesn't have room for a last-minute trip.
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