| New album "WYSIWYG" |
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a friendly opening, "guess what: i'm with stupid, cos i'm with you." so, what is this ? tubthumping part II ? the follow up to the smash hit, same formula, done with less style ?
as much as the first song seems to be a reply to the reaction to "tubthumping" (the song you love to hate -TM-), the rest of the album is obviously no attempt to answer to anyone's expectations but to continue what chumbawamba do best: their own thing. purists hate it, dogmatists sneer, critics ask for the relevance - will the fans still understand ? the new fanbase either adopted to the chumba-style of "not giving a damn" (like dorothy parker said) or they will wonder what this cheap-las-vegas-style-revue has to do with their frat boy-parties on budweiser.
no, nothing new, really. that's if you think radical pop-music is nothing new. this falls into no category, probably even more decidedly than previous chumba-efforts. it's even more mellow than the last offering, relaxed even. yet it's got a subtle groove from start to finish that's almost easy listening - in a subversive kind of way. again, to expect a re-writing of "unilever" on this record is seriously off the mark. Purists note: advertising slogans have taken over the word "revolution" long ago. consequently, the line "where do you want to go today/ somewhere you can never take me" is more revealing and inspiring than a "smash microsoft"-chorus would have been. the pie-throwing in the context of a popsong, so to speak. it seemed that the chumba-style of singing became even more accessible for the mainstream, when the eurythmics released their comeback-single "i saved the world today" earlier in 1999 - with a vocal melody nicked from the chumba-book of stolen songs and annie lennox imitating lou as best as she could. now, the chumbas answer it with: "honey, i blew up the world".
lyrically, the chumbas seem to insist on their right to view things their own way. i have no lyric sheet to back me up here, but "i am not sorry/ I was having fun" in a the context of a song that seems to attack the idiots that played woodstock or "well you can buy your friends/ but i'll hate you for free" in another song suggest that their position is unchanged. You have to play the game, but you don't have to obey (all) the rules. "i've got that old time religion", "who says the story has to end that way ?". "if you have to ask, then it's out of your range".
a personal opinion after listening to a pre-final-mix of the new stuff: I like it a lot, but it's hard to pick out a stand out song, which is kinda like i felt about the "first 2".
fact-friends note: there's noticeably (is that a word ?) few appearances by alice or danbert, which makes it even more interesting to see how songs >from this album will be transformed into the next chumba-live-appearance...
musically, it's a step back towards the "concept"-style of earlier chumba-albums, the songs are shorter, there seems to be some sort of ongoing-theme (a society obssessed with technology and consumerism) and it changes from singalong-pop-chorus to comedy-country to modern-dance beats to accapella folk-style to classical samples to rap within seconds. Nothing new, then.