Good Morning Spider by Sparklehorse (Good Morning Spider - Sparklehorse)

Member Name: Lichfield1979

Product:	Good Morning Spider - Sparklehorse
Date:	07/09/08 (145 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Maria's Little Elbows

Disadvantages: n/a

Good Morning Spider by Sparklehorse (1998)

Producer and multi-instrumentalist Mark Linkous recorded most of this record himself, not long after his protracted recovery from a drug overdose that had him confined to a wheelchair for half a year. As well as singing, he plays guitar, bass, piano, wurlitzer, optigan, sampler, vibraphone, harmonium, concertina, percussion and drum machine. He is joined on various tracks by cello, drums, cornet, violin, piano, and pedal steel guitar.

Linkous is extremely talented when it comes to dynamics and sonic textures, and captures some extraordinary moods in an original fashion. He's equally happy employing aching bittersweet jazz influences as he is crafting perfect rock and roll songs which spill over into distorted angry post-punk. The frequently fragmented sound may have hamstrung the commercial appeal of his melodies but it gives the album a rare level of ambitious vision. The critics knew it was one of the best albums of its year, even if the record buying public remained largely oblivious.

One - Pig

The first ten seconds of Pig sounds like a dreamy and delirious fairytale as a wordless high-pitched babble coos above low-fi guitar strumming. Scratchy metallic guitar riffs and the throaty distorted noise of a punk vocal promptly shatter that with another child-like spell of their own. The deft structure of the next two minutes is disguised underneath waves of jagged electronic vibration and clattering tinny percussion. The gruff voice actually reveals itself to be fragile but is fed through such volumes of feedback that it resembles a technological signal cutting through white noise - or perhaps a baby sobbing - more than it does speech, before abruptly stopping as the music finishes with ten seconds of womb-like calm.

Two - Painbirds

A persistent percussive tapping under lays softly cracked vocals and jazz flourishes that sound like rainbows painting colour into the grey sky as a thunderstorm comes to wash away the sticky summer heat. Finally the song dissolves into a swell of strings glistening like raindrops. The cornet sounds magnificent.

Three - Saint Mary

Achingly melancholic, the rickety structure of this song creaks along with beautiful age and wonder in its belly. The voice has feeble sad warmth that never flickers out, and the acoustic guitar plucks at emotional memories and routines. The lyrics and strings sound like they're near death. A glorious four minutes that makes an allusion to a Denis Johnson novel.

Four - Good Morning Spider

This is a minute long instrumental interlude of lulling sounds with dark undertones that harbinger nothing.

Five - Sick of Goodbyes

The first pop song on the record has a vocal with a gentle haziness at first before it clarifies itself and the music grows fuzzier. The melody and guitar hooks are simple but effective and the lyric complains cheerfully.

Six - Box of Stars (Part One)

Another half minute bridging passage with a dreamy expansive sound and some words this time.

Seven - Sunshine

The vocal is soft and delicate and the music floats like a tide of chimes lapping steadily as riffs row back against it like oars. The production sounds like a satellite picking up waves as well. Contains the wonderful observation that the sunshine "had been out all night." The melodies are extremely friendly and the atmosphere is laidback.

Eight - Chaos of the Galaxy / Happy Man

Chaos of the Galaxy is another forty-five second intermission of spacey sustained notes. Happy Man is a masterpiece. Radio static begins to intrude on the organ intro. A vocal cracks through but keeps fading in and out, sometimes completely, as if the transmission isn't strong enough to be received on this bandwidth. It's like turning the dial on an old AM radio to get a better sound on the right frequency, and sometimes Chaos of the Galaxy creeps back in. Low-fi guitar strumming is enmeshed in the interference, and gradually it blossoms into big discordant echoes of a riff we still can't hear with clear fidelity as the signal peaks and troughs yet again and the drums join in on the margins of perception. Then the rhythm section seizes control of the song and the volume crescendos as clarity sustains itself and the full band throttles through in rising bursts. That riff comes back and is replaced by a bigger one and the drums are pounding and punchy and the vocal is gruff and throaty. The music is energetic and triumphant. Guitars spiral off in exuberant rubbery excitement and then the song is finished and the original spacey intermission is restored for a few last seconds. The lyrics are gibberish, even if on a couple of occasions they appear to be quoting James Joyce, but the phrasing is strong, and the message "All I want is to be a happy man" is clear enough.

Nine - Hey Joe

This is a cover version of the Daniel Johnston song and substitutes his direct sense of childlike wonder for a lush crackle of melancholy without altering the melody. Linkous has collaborated with Johnston - who suffers acutely with bipolar disorder - in the past.

Ten - Come On In

More sad and humble music floating in clouds of aching dream, perhaps above a hospital. The lyrics are layered and sung in croaky rounds, as befits a reworking of an eighteenth century children's prayer. "Now I lay me down to sleep..." The repetition of breathing may be coming difficult.

Eleven - Maria's Little Elbows

The best song on the record; although there are other candidates, the yearning orchestral keyboards elevate this into the stratosphere and set the spine tingling, and the tune was already fantastic before we reached that far. The first burst of guitar makes an instant play for your affections and the ornate blend of acoustic electronica fast feels huggable before the refrain of "loneliness" steals your heart with pining warmth. The line "she said I've really come to hate my body / and all the things that it requires in this world" is misquoted from the Velvet Underground song as though it's being said by the titular character in this song.

Twelve - Cruel Sun

A two-and-a-half minute alt-rock song, with sneering distorted vocals that start off deep then grow high pitched and shrill, as bass-line and drums pump things forward. The electric guitar solo at the end is honey-stung and gorgeous.

Thirteen - All Night Home

Dawdles sleepy peaceably like a passenger slumbering as the road recedes beneath the wheels and the journey takes what time it takes and the needle of the speedometer needn't hurry or worry in the dark.

Fourteen - Ghost of His Smile

A slanted slice of pop music laden with hooks filtered through production tricks. The programmed drumbeat chugs like an engine and the keyboard riffs have a spooky bright simplicity. The lyric "and we thought that he was doing alright" does sound a bit ambiguous, but the song has an appreciation of the small moments that make life worth living.

Fifteen - Hundreds of Sparrows

Loving fearful tenderness fills this song in the vein of Maria's Little Elbows, only with an acoustic glow accompanied by strings. "I'm so sorry, my spirit's rarely in my body" he sings sweetly, above piano, drums and cello.

Sixteen - Box of Stars (Part Two)

Fifty seconds of rippling noise in lots of colours.

Seventeen - Junebug

Another touchingly sedate ballad to finish proceedings as the vocal tickles its way around the lyrics and an acoustic guitar pedals softly on a footpath of chimes. As usual the metaphors are completely esoteric but maybe the song is about finding courage in the company of a beautiful woman. There's an Exorcist reference in there, so who knows.


I remember buying this record on a wintry morning in Cambridge, along with a copy of Underworld by Don DeLillo, and the two really compliment each other in a strange way. Can that really be ten years ago?

Summary: This record may have ripened into one of the best of the 1990s