Lady Gaga - Born This Way (2011)

1) Marry the Night; 2) Born This Way; 3) Government Hooker; 4) Judas; 5) Americano; 6) Hair; 7) Scheiße; 8) Bloody Mary; 9) Bad Kids; 10) Highway Unicorn (Road to Love); 11) Heavy Metal Lover; 12) Electric Chapel; 13) Yoü and I; 14) The Edge of Glory; Bonus track: 15) Born This Way (Jost & Naaf Remix) 

Over the top, larger than life, sprawling - iconic.

Key tracks: "Scheiße", "Heavy Metal Lover", "The Edge of Glory"

The success of The Fame Monster gave Lady Gaga the artistic freedom to follow it up however she best wanted, and the stylistic break-out of that album had left people eagerly anticipating what her next move would be. These days it's difficult to convey accurately just how different and fresh The Fame Monster's theatrically explosive and wildly flaying maneuvres sounded in the 2010 pop scene if you weren't there to experience it, and back then The Fame Monster was still technically considered just a deluxe edition bonus disc for The Fame until its runaway success more or less turned it into a runaway era of its own. Yet, I don't think anyone was ready for just how Gaga chose to follow it up; even now, Born This Way is spectacularly one of the strangest albums to occupy mainstream space with such dominance.

The sound of Born This Way itself is a direct follow-up from the high intensity dance pop of The Fame Monster: Redone remains as the main producer and Gaga's second-in-command, with DJ White Shadow  making his debut Gaga collaborations in-between. The ideas and aesthetics though - including that unbelievable/bly terrible cover image - are directly indebted to 80s hard rock. Gaga is an old-school heavy metal lover through and through and Born This Way is through and through a hair metal record, with big guitar riffs, crashing drums and a stench of whiskey cutting through the hyper-produced electronic sheen, old-fashion stadium rock theatrics reinterpreted in Gaga’s own language. Born This Way is also everything Gaga made her music out to be, super-sized up and overindulged in. It doubles down on all the eccentricities and quirks that lent The Fame Monster its strength, attempting to bring Gaga's music to the same level of unpredictability and out-thereness that her increasingly bizarre fashion displays had started to reach. 

That clash of titanic concepts is what makes Born This Way so overwhelming and uniquely thrilling. The album is at its best when its pushing down the throttle pedal in a neon glow adrenaline haze and throwing together ideas that would take supreme confidence to pull off - which she does. "Judas" stomps through with an erratic pace like an elephant in a china shop that's having a bad trip, "Americano" is a rave-rock-flamenco hybrid that proudly ignores the fact that it shouldn't work, "Bloody Mary" resurrects pop's eternal fascination with a soft reggae lilt and makes it sound hair-raisingly ominous, "Scheiße" finds Gaga speaking nonsense-German over cavernous eurodance synths and a beat so big it hits right in the spine, the unhinged "Government Hooker" goes through moods and tones like it's switching radio channels from one extreme to another. These are songs that happen when no one says "no" to even the most ridiculous idea and everyone fully believes in the power of their underlying force - i.e. Gaga and her charisma that persuades any naysayer, even when she sounds like a woman possessed flicking through incoherent accents and vocal shifts as she sings through most songs in brand new manners and ways from anything before. These are songs that in lesser hands someone would have toned down but that didn't happen, and it's all for the better. They are excessive and manic, and while flamboyant they're almost dark with the bombast used to drown over any demons of self-doubt creeping in through every crack they can. Gaga always sounds like she's at the forefront of a great battle in each song, determined to come out victorious.

Sadly that energy doesn't quite reach the album's title track, even though it's inarguably the most famous song from the entire era. It's easy to view it through a modern viewpoint now and judge it as slightly tone deaf - the "chola and orient descent" didn't sound right in 2011 either - but it's a song that means well, came at the right time when LGBT+ was starting to break into the mainstream more visibly than ever and eventually it deservedly became the anthem of pride and underdog unity that Gaga desired it to be from day one, the (ultimately superfluous) "Express Yourself" controversy nonwithstanding. But despite naming the album, "Born This Way" has always been at odds with the rest of the record. In a album coloured in shades of seedy nightlife and desperation to break free from it, "Born This Way" is all rainbow lights and thin disco beats, with none of the edge or surprise that the rest of the album revels in. It never fit the album comfortably and almost exists outside it as its own entity, and despite being one of Gaga's biggest hits and nailing down her status as the heartfelt ally she sincerely wants to be, its appearance right at the start is almost jarring and in all ways - production, melody, really even the lyrics despite the message - it's throwing weaker punches than most other songs on the album. You can contrast it directly with "The Edge of Glory", another song that's covered in more neon lights than club spotlights and plays its hand brighter than the rest of the record, but also keeping truer to the album's heart. Its nods to the 80s are in line with the rest of the album (including a saxophone solo from Springsteen's right hand man Clarence Clemons) and it retains the emotion and will of what preceded it - it's the one last tearful goodbye to Gaga's grandfather and she sings it with all her abandon as the synths grow taller and louder, scraping skies as the album's ultimate pop anthem. As the closer it's the dawnbreak after the album's seedy nightlife crawl - the hopeful start to a brand new day. 

Though its more peculiar moments are what ultimately define Born This Way, as "The Edge of Glory" (and "Born This Way") shows the album is content to simply be a pop record at times as well. Sometimes perhaps a little too earnestly - the theatre kid camp of "Hair" comes to mind - but by and far even at her more controlled Gaga works magic here. The grand epic kickstart of "Marry the Night" which sets the album off with a firework display, revs up from naught to hundred after its beguilingly quiet organ intro and makes the case for the album's strengths immediately. It's exhilirating, life-affirming and triumphant - so basically everything you want a larger than life pop anthem to be. "Bad Kids" goes from stuttering synth stabs and grungy guitars to saccharine bubblegum pirouettes in an instant, and "Heavy Metal Lover" might just be one of Gaga's most essential songs, tucked away unassumingly in the depths of the back half but boasting some of the album's best hooks and production: ironically not leaning towards its titular style despite the rest of the album giving the space for it, its ethereal and crystalline synth-disco sound and that instantly striking half-wordless chorus are among the most powerful moments of pure pop bliss in Gaga's discography.

What mars Born This Way somewhat is that it is ever so slightly overlong, and this is even the case with the standard issue without the (rather common) deluxe edition's bonus tracks weaved into the tracklist - although my Euro-version copy does come additionally equipped with a perfectly adequate remix of "Born This Way" that you forget the moment you stop listening to it. Some of the chaff is easier to identify, namely "Highway Unicorn" and "Electric Chapel" which largely serve to build the album's internal mythos and aesthetic rather than act as independent agents of their own. That isn't strictly speaking a bad thing and not something I would always criticise, but they sound like songs designed for live stage interludes and their hooks and vigour aren't a match for the rest of the record; not to mention "Highway Unicorn" is where the album's loudness war PTSD rears its head the most obviously as its synths and drums reach clipping heights so much it's distracting. And with distractions in mind, when the album does depart from its general ethos it really, really sticks out - "Born This Way" including, but also "Hair" that's all bright highlights and hi-NRG stomping covered in the kind of cheese that's bound to split opinions, and I'm not sure it has a place here. But this was an imperial period for Gaga and even "Hair" starts to charm when its intensity just doesn't let up and it blows off in all cylinders so charismatically you forget what qualms you had with it. 

"Yoü and I" is the other main breakaway: it's where Gaga finally nails the classic rock piano ballad that she's been trying to pull off on both her previous albums, and would practically come across as a cosplay pastiche if she wasn't so convincing and giving her all with it, but what's it doing here? Besides maybe peeling off some of those theatrical layers and giving Gaga a brief moment of unarmed humanity as she so honestly both seizes in a kind of music she so obviously loves and reaches out for her man without any smoke and mirrors - "six whole years!", she adlibs with such spur-of-the-moment you can absolutely hear her giggle. Her eventual break-up from the man who inspired it of course now makes the song even more bittersweet, and arguably and very cruelly adds to its power. So even "Yoü and I" works and by the time Gaga's unleashing the final bombastic choruses you've fully bought into it, which both underlines just how much of an imperial period this was for Gaga and just how confusing the album can sometimes be.

It's not an album for everyone. The production is over the top, the lyrics can go from incoherent to cheesy to actually kind of brilliant in a moment's flash ("Love is like a brick / you can build a house or sink a dead body" is probably my favourite Gaga lyric but it also occupies the same song as "if offenced, wear an ear condom next time"), it's self-awarely high on its own pretension and absurdity - and let's face it, Gaga spent so many years spiralling off this that you could consider this the beginning of the end and see it for its warning signs and not for its strengths. Born This Way practically invites you to raise an opinion out of it with it sheer outrageousness, right down from that cover. It is an overreaching mess - but it's also a blast and a one-of-a-kind pop phenomenon. Gaga was a character larger than anything - that was her goal from day one - and with Born This Way she rose to that self-mantled throne. It's a passion project that has everything thrown into it because it had Gaga's worst enemy against it - her own expectations - and it needed to rise into the occasion. It did, with its big verses, bigger choruses, production that still sounds stylish even when it aims for a throwback vibe, the endlessly quotable lines in both content and delivery and, in a nutshell, Gaga's best set of songs. I'm a sucker for an album that dreams big and then grabs hold of that dream, and Born This Way ticks that box so well. If it were more leaner and meaner it might be genuinely legendary, but its shambling kitchen sink attitude is its own kind of iconic and it still stands out as one of the very best pop records of the 2010s.

Rating: 8/10

CMX - Cloaca Maxima II (2004)

CD1 (Lyijy): 1) Olet tässä; 2) Surunmurhaaja; 3) Jatkuu niinkuin sade; 4) Pohjoista leveyttä; 5) Taivaan lapset; 6) Lepattajat; 7) Ei yksikään; 8) Luuhamara; 9) Puuvertaus; 10) Pirunnyrkki; 11) Minne paha haudattiin; 12) Palvelemaan konetta; 13) Meidän syntimme (Edit); 14) Pyörivät sähkökoneet '04
CD2 (Helium): 1) Kauneus pettää; 2) Kuoleman risteyksestä vielä kolme virstaa pohjoiseen; 3) Vainajala '04; 4) Minun sydämeni on särkynyt; 5) Tuonen lintu; 6) Sillanrakentaja; 7) Sielunvihollinen; 8) Baikonur (Edit); 9) Tähdet sylissään; 10) Tuulilukko; 11) Myrskyn ratsut; 12) Melankolia; 13) Revontulten repijä; 14) Vanha talvitie
CD3 (Uraani): 1) Päämäärä; 2) Ei tästä maailmasta; 3) Väkivallan moottorit; 4) π; 5) Kvartetto rock-yhtyeelle ja solistille, op. 1; 6) Ehdotus ensimmäisen mainoskatkon paikaksi; 7) Ruisperkele; 8) Kolme kimaltavaa neitoa; 9) Kiusaajien kiusaaja; 10) Epäluoma; 11) Negatiivinen asenne; 12) Ehdota jotain parempaa; 13) Punainen nro. 6; 14) Helevetinkone; 15) 10¹¹⁸; 16) Huntu

Another set of b-sides and familiar favourites spread across three discs. And this time it's really, really impressive.

Key tracks: Of the previously unreleased and non-album material, "Puuvertaus", "Kauneus pettää", "Päämäärä"

Aion seems like a good time to pause for a moment and look back to the past few years, no? By the end of 2003 CMX were at their critical peak and regularly appearing in the airplay charts, having reached that glorious part of an artist's career where you garner respect from critics, fans and the general audience alike and have secured yourself in the pop culture history books. Cloaca Maxima II started out as just a b-side compilation until the band were convinced to do another triple-CD selection to cap off another chapter of their lifetime: this time summarising the fabled imperial phase years they'd been enjoying during the four album stretch from Vainajala to Aion.

The composition of the collection follows the original 1997 Cloaca Maxima, so the first two discs are devoted to a selection of singles and noteworthy album tracks, split between heavier and louder songs on the first CD (subtitled Lyijy - "Lead") and softer or weirder cuts on the second CD (Helium). There genuinely isn't anything to quibble about the tracks chosen: of course there's some personal favourites I think would've fit nicely here, but the overall selection is so strong that any complaints seem weak: you've even got both the ambient prog odyssey "Baikonur" (even if edited down to eight minutes to fit the disc) and the haunting synth nightmare "Sielunvihollinen", even though they're hardly the songs you'd first think to include because of how out there they are (but I'm glad they're here, both being among the best songs of their respective albums). The flow is also done superbly, especially on the second disc that ties together all its diverse tracts into a real epic experience that could be an album onto its own.

Both CDs also come with some new songs, non-album singles and remakes that are exclusive to this release physically. The two brand new songs in particular are absolutely top notch and throw away any notion of compilation singles being filler. "Olet tässä" kicks off the entire thing with fierce fury and vigour, going from nil to hundred in an instance and laughing maniacally as it does so and its machine gun of a chorus being a real tour de force moment; "Kauneus pettää" meanwhile creeps in through its e-bowed textures and spatial production, acting like a simple pop song with its clear and straightforward structure but just like in its title, it deceives. There's something unsettling to its cold and clinical delivery, beautiful though it is. Both songs join the CMX classics club immediately and are just as essential as any of the canonically bigger tracks included. Those include "Puuvertaus", a turn-of-millennium non-album single with great big guitar walls, a startlingly lush string section and an extended metaphor lyric that in its relative simplicity counts among Yrjänä's best - and the song overall is absolutely fantastic, its inclusion here being one of the best things about the compilation. The other non-album single "Lepattajat" on the other hand is far less exciting and probably one of the weakest songs across the three discs, making a lot of aimless hullaballoo for four minutes that doesn't stick in the slightest. The two 2004 remixes also feel like they're here primarily just because the original Cloaca Maxima had some re-recordings. The new "Vainajala" is a simple remix that only amplifies the guitars of the (great) original but is overall superfluous, and the re-recording of the debut album's "Pyörivät sähkökoneet" is fine but inessential, mainly just giving the listener a direct idea of how different the band sounds 14 years after the original's release.

The third disc ("Uraani/Uranium") is the b-sides compilation and it's the most deranged collection of CMX songs ever put together on a single disc. Yrjänä mentions in the (expansive and comment/trivia-heavy) liner notes that most of the b-sides for the period this compilation spans were written, arranged and recorded on a single day: the band would book a day in the studio just to record a song for a single bonus track, turn up with no plans and see what today's whims would result in. Sometimes that shows up all the way to the track titles ("Ehdota jotain parempaa" = "Suggest Something Better" after constant nagging about song titles, "Ehdotus ensimmäisen mainoskatkon paikaksi" = "Suggestion for the Placement of the First Ad Break" after a script that had been left in the studio by the previous customers), mostly just in the madness of the music. The headbanger hell chorus of "Väkivallan moottoreita", the half-acoustic half-metal mental breakdown of a folk song "Ehdotus ensimmäisen mainoskatkon paikaksi", the hard rock reggae rhythm and the ludicruous chorus stumble of "Ruisperkele", the electronic dark night of the soul of "10¹¹⁸"... I mean the list goes on. No idea (or riff) is considered too absurd not to include, and CMX at their most unhinged is often exciting and sometimes borderline hilarious. And right next to those descents into madness are some genuinely beautiful songs like “π” and “Punainen nro. 6” - songs that are perhaps a little rough around the edges, but which among the chaotic energy around them sound downright bizarrely lovely and uncomplicated. The opener “Päämäärä” is the sole brand new song of the third disc, a band recording of a song Yrjänä wrote for a TV show: within its whirlwind drums and guitars that split between screaming sirens and brightly glowing melodies, it somehow distills all three discs into a single impressive song.

The Cloaca Maxima compilations are odd birds because their 3-CD big box scope doesn't smoothly suit the needs of either the casual listener or the familiar fan, both of whom might find the contents a little excessive from different perspectives. Cloaca Maxima II hits that sweet spot though, where it serves both as a deep introduction to the band (or at least one particular era of theirs) - like it did for me when I first started to seriously gain interest to the group - as well as a rewarding listen even once you've become a convert. It's the type of compilation that all its ilk should aspire to, acting like a celebration of the career sumarised within and sequenced in such a way that even an experienced fan can get something out of how the songs they're intimately familiar with are presented. I still listen to the first two discs - and the second disc in particular - because they work so well as a hit-to-hit ride and are in such a satisfying order. The third disc is like a secret album unearthed, most obviously a compilation because of how it runs all over the place but still sequenced with care to make its screwball characteristics work. That third disc alone is worth the money here for anyone who enjoyed the four albums the compilation puts in a nutshell, but this genuinely doesn't feel like money wasted in a way some other, lesser compilations do.

Rating: 9/10

James Dean Bradfield - Even in Exile (2020)

1) Recuerda; 2) The Boy from the Plantation; 3) There'll Come a War; 4) Seeking the Room with the Three Windows; 5) Thirty Thousand Milk Bottles; 6) Under the Mimosa Tree; 7) From the Hands of Violeta; 8) Without Knowing the End (Joan's Song); 9) La Partida; 10) The Last Song; 11) Santiago Sunrise

Part prog rock, part musical - Bradfield indulges in his more conceptual flair, given the chance.

Key tracks: "Recuerda", "Without Knowing the End (Joan's Song)", "The Last Song"

I was as surprised as anyone that James Dean Bradfield ever released a second solo album - and that probably includes Bradfield himself. The Manic Street Preachers frontman is a workaholic who's always writing and composing, but he's faithfully devoted to his band. Since its release his attitude towards his 2006 debut solo album has been that of a formerly faithful husband caught cheating, embarrassedly brushing it off as a moment's folly, and any other solo work since has been various soundtrack work for small independent projects. Most of those have never seen an official release, and Bradfield has kept his musical endeavours tightly synonymous with his band. That long silence was broken by Even in Exile, a song cycle about the Chilean activist and musician Victor Jara, and even this didn't start out as an album or even Bradfield to begin with, but as a personal writing exercise for Patrick Jones, brother of Manics' Nicky Wire and Bradfield's close friend. Bradfield caught wind and Jara's life became a passion project for both men who have collaborated in the past in a variety of off-hand projects (including some of those aforementioned soundtracks), where they turned the poems into lyrics and from there into songs.

Bradfield is the voice of his band in many ways and Even in Exile isn't a million miles away from a Manics record - Bradfield's vocals and guitar chops are immediately recognisable even from a distance, and he isn't actively dodging the similarities either. You can't really ask a leopard to change its spots, much less one who seemingly shudders at the thought of breaking away from his day job - and so, Even in Exile hits a lot of familiar beats for anyone who's familiar with Bradfield's day job. Parts of the record could have well appeared on a Manics album, especially whenever Bradfield aims directly for the jugular: the anthemic and radio-ready "The Boy from the Plantation", the excited firecracker "Without Knowing the End" and the piano-guided stomper "Thirty Thousand Milk Bottles" all nestle in familiar Bradfield territory. "The Boy from the Plantation" in particular is exactly the kind of archtypical lead single which Bradfield is keen to include on each album these days, and its soaring choruses and biography-heavy lyrics (serving as the cliff's notes intro to Jara for anyone who's unfamiliar with him) would feel at home on any Manics album from the past ten years. But if anything, those familiar traits appearing across here display just how well he's perfected that loud and ecstatic guitar anthem vibe rather than showing any signs of a songwriter stuck in his own groove. "The Boy from the Plantation" is admittedly predictable, but when that chorus soars it's practically irresistable; and without "Without Knowing the End" Even in Exile would be a much lesser album as it zooms past with such life-affirming energy that's not been heard in a Manics album in a while.

And then there's the other side of the album. This is the first time Bradfield has worked on an honest concept album and having that clear throughline has given him space to let loose and experiment. Even in Exile is on closer examination Bradfield taking his lowkey soundtrack work to the next level by merging that level of aural storytelling with his usual rock band tricks. The combination is that Even in Exile turns out to be as much a prog rock album as it is a musical. The songs go through Jara's life from his unassuming beginnings to his tragic end, starting with a clear theme-setting overture ("Recuerda") and ending with a post mortem epilogue about his legacy by way of "Santiago Sunrise", with each key character in Jara's life getting their own their signature songs along the way. These pieces have then been arranged around unexpected time signature and key changes and the songs often start in one place and either finish in or detour somewhere completely different along the way. There's even three widescreen instrumental compositions just to further underline the connections to Bradfield's soundtrack work, including a cover of Jara's "La Partida" which has been transformed from a jaunty acoustic number to a bombastic spaghetti western theme. Bradfield has been subtly flirting with less formulaic song structures across the past few Manics albums prior to this, and Even in Exile sounds like the logical next step from there, taken to distances that he perhaps doesn't feel fits the core Manics sound.

It's not like Bradfield goes wildly mad with the songs - strong centrepiece choruses and tightly wrapped four-minute songs are an integral part of his writer's DNA. But he's never predictable either. You couldn't ask for a better opener than "Recuerda" in that respect, moving through its mini-suites of differing tempos and tones from subtle soundtrack textures to explosive stadium guitars, thrilling throughout its bombastic run as it acts as an introduction to Even in Exile's shifts. "The Last Song" breaks out into lengthy, synth-driven instrumental vignettes, "From the Hands of Violeta" cuts through its gentle mood by the later choruses that jolt into life with wild abandon, alongside many other smaller surprises scattered throughout. While his signature guitar is all across the album, Even in Exile also sees Bradfield compose with a piano for the first time in his long career and that's likely where some of the more unexpected sounds originate from; this most notably reveals itself in the haunting duo of "There'll Come a War" and "Sandiago Sunrise", both immensely atmospheric and spatial pieces where the lonely piano notes are accompanied by a booming drum machine and various guitar and keyboard textures respectively.

The instrumentals, too, are of note. They're miniature film scores played with rock band arrangements, perfectly telling a story through music alone with no verbal accompaniment. They feel a little superfluous (or abundant) at first, but they do bridge together the album closer together and help the flow of the narrative move smoothly from the triumphant beginnings to the bittersweet and uncertain end. Jara's story isn't a particularly happy one - he had a humongous impact to Chilean culture through his songs and he protested the political powers that be by bringing ordinary people together by singing about them, which then lead to him being targeted when Augusto Pinochet rose to power and shortly after his brutal death by the hands of Pinochet's squards. Even in Exile starts as a celebration of Jara and his impact but the chronological song sequence becomes more and more wistful the closer towards the album reaches Jara's end. The end is not without its glimmer of hope as Jara's death only served to gild his legacy and both "The Last Song" and "Santiago Sunrise" simmer through a mix of funeral sadness and burning defiance. The song cycle does genuinely feel like a story is being told through music and the instrumentals help depict what words can't through their atmosphere: "Seeking the Room with the Three Windows" radiantly explodes as one of the album's most out-and-out rock moments to insinuate how intensely the gear suddenly shifted in Jara's life, "Under the Mimosa Tree" serves as a spot of peace centered around the warmth of Jara's personal life, and his own "La Partida" shouts out with triumph one last time before the end.

The one particularly exciting facet across all eleven songs is hearing Bradfield sound so free-spirited and uncharacteristically jovial, seeing as how these days he treats his band with utmost seriousness most of the time. There's flashes of the old sly fox familiar for long-time fans revealing itself throughout Even in Exile, in its cheeky little tempo twists, jubilant melodic explosions and the general unrestricted inspiration it operates on. Writing for something with tangible continuity in its content has inspired Bradfield to tailor his music accordingly and despite its obvious standalone candidates (which work perfectly outside the context, for the record), Even in Exile works best as a body of work - and by aiming to make such a record, it's resulted in Bradfield bringing some genuinely new ideas to the table. It also makes sense as a James Dean Bradfield release specifically rather than as a Manic Street Preachers album by any other name, showing off aspects that might not ever be extended to this degree in his band's music. For a man who's on his fourth decade of releasing records - and for a fan who's followed those records for around for three quarters of that time span - that's wild, even ecstatic.

Rating: 8/10