ABOUT LLOYD COLE LLOYD COLE: GUESSWORK Some albums coalesce around a
title. Lloyd Cole’s new album is one such record. Guesswork mirrors
the uncertainty of the world as you enter your third act. Guesswork is
consistent with a record whose protagonists seem reluctant to venture
confidently beyond the moment. In terms of minutes, it’s his
longest, but in terms of songs, it’s shorter than any of his
previous eleven solo albums (fourteen if you count those he made with
The Commotions). Guesswork is also his shortest in terms of total
words sung. This might come as a surprise to those who primarily
remember Lloyd for the precocious literary pop dispatches of 1984’s
Rattlesnakes, the debut album which earned him an unlikely place
alongside Wham! and Duran Duran in the following year’s Smash
Hits/Panini sticker book. However, for other onlookers who have
followed his progress in the interim – taking in the muscular urban
art-rock of his solo debut X (1990), the delicate digital folk of
Music In A Foreign Language (2004) and a succession of electronic
albums culminating in 2015’s 1D – that may be less so. Mostly
constructed in his Massachusetts attic space, Lloyd’s first
“songs” album since 2013’s universally acclaimed Standards sees
him finally create a (mostly) electronic setting for his voice. “For
a while,” he says, “it wasn’t clear if the project would ever
come to fruition. I’ve always listened to electronic music, ever
since hearing albums like [Iggy Pop’s] The Idiot and [David
Bowie’s] Low. There’s a simplicity to those records – even the
gentle songs are very brutally projected. As I’ve got older, I’ve
become more attracted to lyrics that suit that delivery. Ageing is
brutal and lends itself to a less ornamented way of writing.” Once
Lloyd had formulated a sonic picture of the record he wanted to make,
the arrival of each new song gradually brought that picture into
focus. Although autobiographical interpretations of his songs have
always been discouraged, The Over Under might resonate with “empty
nesters” casting their gaze around four walls that might once have
paid host to the laughter of children. It’s an unflinching
slow-reveal establishing shot: a sparse study of a life released from
the tension but also the structure of duty. Much of what follows seems
to hang weightlessly in the vacuum vacated by the “certainty” of
youth (one of two nods here to Robert Palmer’s Johnny & Mary, the
other being the rhythm of Violins). This is a place far beyond
romantic idealism. This is a place where lovers ponder their options,
turn to each other and float the notion that they “ could pool
together/And be half right all of the time .” A place where, on The
Loudness Wars , partners seek to hammer out an accord between their
failings and their feelings: “Yeah, I’m a cold fish/Nobody’s
choice dish/And you’re on fire.” At times, the experience of
listening to Guesswork is akin to sitting in a sleek, state-of-the-art
departure lounge, unsure of quite where you’re waiting to go. It’s
a feeling that finds its purest expression amid the pensive stabs and
brittle snare cracks that measure out The Afterlife ’s hungover
existential audit and Remains – the latter one of two songs on the
record co-written by Lloyd’s old Commotions colleague Blair Cowan.
Over a synergy of rapt synths and exquisite saxophone, the song finds
Lloyd riding the seemingly sudden realisation that “we’re nothing
to no-one” – a rueful inversion of the sentiments parlayed on
1990’s Don’t Look Back ( “When you’re nothing to no one/And
you’re less than you can…” ) “When I was 27,” notes Lloyd,
“The concept of the washed up older guy seemed very entertaining.”
And now? And now, he says, “I’m starting to think that old age
could be a lot more fun than middle age. Because really what have we
got to lose?” Certainly those sentiments are borne out by some of
the brighter, poppier arrangements on Guesswork . With its neon
Oberheim twinkle pushed to the fore, the unguarded intimacies of
Moments & Whatnot seem to locate a blissful equidistant point between
The Man Machine-vintage Kraftwerk and Robyn. Float that comparison
past Lloyd Cole, and he’s anything but perturbed. “That’s great.
Robyn has made probably my favourite music of the last fifteen years.
I think she’s a genius; she’s almost the Prince of her
generation.” Further ramping up the melodic quotient is an sublime
slice of mid-life synth-pop which answers to the name of Violins .
Were it not for the unmistakeable voice that hits the ground running
with the lines, “The missile leaves the car/Flies through the window
pane” , you might be forgiven for thinking you’d taken a left turn
into the new Pet Shop Boys album. “Well, one of the glorious things
about pop is that you have this wonderful uplifting art form which can
actually deal with some fairly challenging issues and sometimes can do
so quite elegantly. That’s what my favourite pop stars do.” On the
face of it, you might be forgiven for thinking that Guesswork finds
Lloyd a universe away from the literate lyrical character studies
scattered across his early records. The word count may have
diminished, but you can attribute that to the authorial confidence
that comes with the passing of time. Indeed, nestled among the still,
sundazed ruminations that dominate Guesswork, is one of Lloyd’s most
compelling narratives. When I Came Down From The Mountain sees its
protagonist abandoning his home in the hope that he might finally cast
off the weight of his sins. “How am I going to live down here?” he
intones over a chorus urgently abetted by guitar work from the other
ex-Commotion on the record, Neil Clark (who will also be accompanying
Lloyd on his upcoming live shows). Completing the rollcall of
long-trusted associates on this record, alongside Neil and Blair, are
New York drummer, programmer and producer Fred Maher who first worked
with Lloyd on X, and executive producer Chris Hughes, whose
association with Lloyd stretches back to the final Commotions album
Mainstream on which he worked in an “informal” capacity. For
Lloyd, the involvement of Chris Hughes provided some much-needed
perspective in moments which saw him uncertain whether he had
jettisoned too much of what was recognisably Lloyd. “When I was
making the record I felt like I was stretching myself artistically,
perhaps even to breaking point, and Chris just laughed. ‘No-one else
could have made this record,’ he said, ‘It’s soaked in
Lloyd-ness’ You realise over time that however much you second-guess
yourself or try and pull yourself in whatever direction, it’s still
you. If you have a voice, you can’t un-voice yourself.”
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31/01/2020 Last update