Fourteen years after Mike Kinsella’s debut
into the music world with American Football,
he releases this, his 14th! solo recording under
the unlikely moniker of Owen. I think I found
American Football backwards only after finding
Owen first. I don’t remember, in 2013, how
I found him or why I landed on this record first,
or why I don’t have any other records by the guy.
After a little digging around in the iTunes digital
library, I find one other Owen album, Ghost Town,
and because I do not own it’s CD counterpart,
I conclude that this was another download from
the Emusic online service, a predecessor to all
the streaming services that are now ubiquitous.
And for some reason, I remember buying this
Owen album, L’Ami Du Peuple, directly from his
label, Polyvinyl Records, because perhaps at the time,
it was a record too obscure for my local record store.
I don’t know if that’s true or not. Mike Kinsella’s
work could hardly be described as obscure, really.
This record begins folky and sad, Kinsella’s
voice sings: “I got high with an art teacher
of mine.” And it all comes back to me. Yes.
This guy’s appeal is his earnestness, his
seriousness, his forlorn, understated voice,
Kermit-like, and his lovely, unadorned lyrics.
The second tune on this album, in 5/4,
demonstrates again, what American Football
demonstrated as the 90’s died, that a song could
rock, be musically odd, progressive, while
at the same time make the listener feel
things–hence, Kinsella and his various
musical projects are often labeled EMO.
“Love is not enough. We need some money.”
One of the best lyric lines ever, I think, and
sure, EMO enough. There are no liner notes
on the cover or in the sleeve of this album,
so I don’t know who plays what or how
many musicians were involved, but these
songs all feature some really great playing,
some dynamic arrangements, really sweet
orchestrations, and vocal melodies that are
better, more interesting than much of the
American Football stuff I’ve heard. Kinsella
still has some vocal limitations–he tends
to navigate around a pretty narrow range
of melodic choices, but the great playing
and surprising arrangements and the smart
lyrics are often enough to deemphasize the
vocal shortcomings. This is a good record.
Better than good. Friend of the people, indeed.
Notes on the vinyl edition: L’Ami du Pueble, Polyvinyl Records, 2013, black vinyl.
In case you don’t already know: I’m listening to almost everything in my vinyl collection, A to Z, and writing at least one, sometimes two or three long skinny poem-like-things in response for each artist, and on a few occasions, writing a long skinny poem-like-thing in response to more than one artist. As a poet and a student of poetry, I understand that these things look like poems, but they don’t really sound much like poetry, hence, I call them “poem-like-things.” I’ll admit that they’re just long, skinny essays that veer every now and then into the poetic or lyric.
michael jarmer 