REVIEW: Varnaline, Sweet Life (Zero Hour)
- Chris Hill
The varied richness of alt-country continually amazes this newbie: the '60s-tinged Pernice Brothers, the rootsy Waco Brothers, the No Depression mainstays Wilco, Son Volt, and the Jayhawks, to name the few artists I've heard. Now added to the list - Varnaline, whose Sweet Life has haunted me since its arrival.
Before I heard a note, from hearsay and conversations, I'd formed a lo-fi four-piece band expectation of bad booze/ women/truck songs. Instead, I was inundated with Pink Floyd/ Moody Blues lushness, contemplative lyrics, and a melding of styles that pay an homage to the past with feet planted firmly in the now. All this from a trio, to boot.
Varnaline's Anders Parker is a creative tsunami, writing all twelve of Sweet Life's songs. He's also solely responsible for two of Varnaline's three previous efforts, '96's Man of Sin and '97's A Shot and a Beer EP. The rest of the band - brother John Parker (bass/etc.) and Jud Ehrbar (drums/vocals/ etc.), plus guest musicians - are indispensable here, however. They flesh out Anders' vision, whether on the transcendent album opener, "Gulf of Mexico" (Anders must love "Dark Side of the Moon"), The Band-esque romp-and-stomp of "Saviours", or the gutsy rocker "Underneath the Mountain".
Parker's paganistic lyrics celebrate the wonder ("Northern Lights", "Mare Imbrium") and healing quality ("Gulf of Mexico", "This is the River") of nature, using subtle metaphors to link man and his environment in a holistic relationship. Not to say it's all touchy-feely. "Now You're Dirt" is a grimly humorous adieu to an estranged parent and a vow not to continue the cycle his dad begun: "I want you to know/ I'm not the same man/that put you in the ground/without a word/ You were the father/Well, now you're dirt."
Parker also shines with love themes. "All about Love" is a song Justin Hayward would envy, where eerily echoing layered singing honors the Catskills church where Sweet Life was recorded. "While You Were Sleeping" - "I wandered around the house/What were you dreaming?...The whole world shut down/I watched you breathing" - is a tender observation of lovers temporarily separated by Morpheus.
Be wary when "Fuck and Fight", a playful XTC song wrapped in country swaddling, finishes. "Mare Imbrium", the next song, is so achingly beautiful that the psyche opened by the toe- tapping previous tune is caught unprepared & vulnerable to an uppercut of a love ballad (to the moon's Sea of Rains). "I've watched your face so many times/You give off so much light/When I'm walking home/Can see if I look straight/Shining under you/No time for this earth/No time at all". Why doesn't every band incorporate the glockenspiel's transitory notes of beauty? Ah, bliss.
But it's the title opus that turns Sweet Life into mead. Viola steps into a pulsing cello, an upright bass runs a simple riff, then a violin plaintively sets its own melody. Cross-fade to drums and electric guitars. Three and a half minutes in, Parker starts to sing of finding satisfaction where the day takes him. "I travel to far shores/To scrounge for change/But count your luck/Watch it all light up/It's a sweet life...You had your chance/And all you got was this sweet life." The gift is more than sufficient.
