1) A Doubt; 2) An Exercise; 3) Time Runs Out; 4) Loss; 5) Unchanging; 6) The Mirror; 7) A Loop; 8) Wishing; 9) Far Away; 10) The Days Have Turned; 11) Helical; 12) The Will to Death
The first of the grand rush of 2004, and it starts with a melancholy, autumnal collection of understated melodies.
Key tracks: "A Doubt", "Loss", "The Will to Death"
From the late 90s onwards Frusciante, now back in full health, was bursting with inspiration and the desire to keep playing and creating music. Within half a decade he had already managed to amass a fairly reputable amount of music between the Red Hot Chili Peppers and his restarted solo career, but no one could have expected what was to come next. Only a couple of months after the release of Shadows Collide with People in early 2004 Frusciante announced that he was going to release six more records in six months during the latter half of the very same year: all brand new music, either under his own name or in new projects spearheaded by him. The real shocker is that the madman actually did it - apart from having to delay the last album of the bunch by a month, Frusciante did good on his word and delivered the same amount of albums within a year that most artists take at least a decade to release these days. While most of the songs were written and recorded during the same initial sessions and later grouped together based on the general sound, it doesn't really take anything away from the achievement - especially given the general level of quality he kept up throughout.
The Will to Death was the first album to follow the announcement, and it's a great introduction to the project overall because it shares its general aesthetic choices with the records to follow. The overall concept isn't too dissimilar from Shadows Collide with People musically, and sees Frusciante delivering relatively conventional rock songs with frequent keyboard flourishes and layered arrangements, so it makes for a reasonable bridge. The production, however, is the big change. All of Frusciante's 2004 rush were recorded in his own home studio, produced by himself with limited overdubs or polish. The albums sound like live takes of Frusciante and his small backing band playing together in the same room, and the sound quality is warm and homely; not quite raw and lo-fi, but distant from any shiny studio glamour. They come across like a glimpse into a private rehearsal space, Frusciante playing right next to you in a personal setting.
The Will to Death's particular characteristic of its own is that it's a very solemn album: the original June release date is completely inappropriate with a record like this that's more at home during gray, rainy days (insert joke about British summers). Compared to the jubilance of creativity that To Record Only Water for Ten Days or Shadows Collide with People were brimming with, where Frusciante sounded happy to just be around playing music, on The Will to Death he's serious and world-weary. The sparse piano-lead "The Mirror" is one of the bleakest songs found on Frusciante's albums and while it's the most overt in this nature, much of The Will to Death is marked by an air of melancholy hanging around; to a point that it sounds practically peaceful in how it's resigned to its own sadness. The album name is a bit of an obvious-in-hindsight giveaway, but the point gets hammered down throughout - on "Unchanging" Frusciante calmly and soothingly sings lines like "it's a pleasure to die, a pleasure to be gone" and "life gave me up and I have no control" and sounds practically relieved while doing so, and "The Days Have Turned" is the most self-loathing set of lyrics Frusciante has written set to a gentle shuffling beat and pretty, minimal guitar. Even the brief instrumental "Helical", as pretty as it is, sounds like it has a sorrowful heart despite its external smile.
That's not to say that The Will to Death is a quiet record. Uncommonly for a Frusciante album it's very much a band record in the sense that the usual rock band trio setup is clearly and powerfully present, and there's a lot of explosive moments scattered throughout where Frusciante kicks up the volume - right from the beginning in fact, with the drum roll intro of "A Doubt" launching into a wistfully chiming guitar riff, and the initial meditative verses pave way for Frusciante eventually going all-out in the song's crescendo, his guitar roaring and voice soaring. Because of the more intimate sound these moments jump out particularly starkly: it's ultimately a production job that favours more mellow moments by default and so when things increase in strength you can practically feel it, such as the verses of "An Exercise" (which flips the usual quiet verses/loud choruses formula upside down) or the hypnotic and appropriately named "A Loop" which grows to a nearly furious intensity. This happens to the best effect in "Loss": despite its name, it's actually (musically) one of the most directly positive moments on the album and its triumphant organ-powered grand finale is one of the album's few moments of genuine light, a Shadows Collide with People moment interpreted in a humbler setting but just as powerfully. And when The Will to Death does dial it down, the results tend to be universally excellent: they're close for comfort but bittersweet in tone, full of the weariness of a man who's been through a lot and is best at channeling that through beautifully simple melody work: the aforementioned "The Days Have Turned" and in particular the understated but devastatingly pretty title track are simple but sublime songs that do not make a big deal about themselves, but have the emotional resonance to cut through any need to make them more complicated with no good reason to.
The Will to Death, in general, follows that very example. It's by and far the least flashy of Frusciante's solo records - even the largely acoustic-focused Curtains has an element of showmanship to it on the very account that it makes a big point about being The Intimate and Stripped-Down Record, and all the others make their presence known very clearly in ways as various as their styles. The Will to Death in comparison is the guy in the corner keeping to himself. It doesn't have Frusciante's flashiest solos or grandest arrangements, and its quiet darkness is really only obvious in hindsight once you begin to read the lyrics - musically it's practically serene in places. But it finds its strengths elsewhere. It's in the lovely guitar work, in Frusciante's vulnerable delivery, in the subtle but touching melodies that leave an impression behind without realising it at first and it's in the cosy, warm production that ties it all together. It's not an album that features many of Frusciante's all-time great classics (I'd pick "Loss" and "The Will to Death" definitely if I were to make a list, "A Doubt" possibly), but it's a perfect example of a record where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, because when all those individual elements are brought together it creates something arresting and resonating. It's arguably Frusciante's most beautiful solo record, but in a way that's not completely apparent from the initial listens. But as it grows, it becomes arresting in its modest grace.
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