All that it amounts to is a tear in a salted sea

The journey continues...

Blind Man's Zoo (1987)

This was purchased pretty soon after In My Tribe and is pretty much along similar lines in terms of lyrical and musical content, but takes a somewhat more less optimistic view of matters (and In My Tribe was hardly happy).

Side One

1. Eat For Two
This is a song about pregnancy and it's certainly not a "oooh - I'm so happy to be having a baby" song ("dream child in my head is a nightmare born in a borrowed bed") but it's not as downbeat as it could be either. I quite like it.

2. Please Forgive Us
This is a song about US foreign policy - it's pretty powerful but not exactly nuanced. I quite like the song, but don't feel it would hurt for it to be slightly more subtle.

3. The Big Parade
This is another not so subtle political song - ostensibly about the Vietnamese war, but it has a nice twist at the end about how these things can look when viewed through the lens of history "Abraham had his war too. But an honest war - or so it's taught in school". Musically, it builds nicely.

4. Trouble Me
For a change, this is quite a nice song where the singer is basically telling someone that they should trust her - "speak to me and let our words build a shelter from the storm". I like it, but it's not one of my absolute favourites.

5. You Happy Puppet
This is a song about people who blindly believe what they're told to think - obviously it has ABSOLUTELY no relevance in these enlightened days. It's a bit too relentlessly upbeat for me musically, but it's not terrible.

6. Headstrong
This is a nice companion piece to the previous song, where the singer is basically saying she's not going to listen to reason, although there is some self-awareness here - "didn't you notice I'm so headstrong - even when I know I'm wrong?". It's also well composed musically, building to a nice crescendo without the singer admitting that she's in any way at fault.

Side Two

1. Poison In The Well
Another upbeat song about a community with a contaminated water supply, with larger connotations around public trust - "tell me, where to now, if your fight for a bearable life can be fought and lost in your backyard?". I like this one - and particularly like Natalie's voice on it as well.

2. Dust Bowl
This is an intense song about poverty and yearning for a better life - "I should know to leave them home - they follow me through the store with these toys I can't afford". The song is simple but effective - I think the songs work better when she takes on more personally relatable targets.

3. The Lion's Share
Having said that, this takes on governments or corporations and works well - "the lambs are bare of fleece and cold; the lion has stolen that, I'm told". It helps that it's a well composed song.

4. Hateful Hate
This is a song about European colonialism in Africa, which doesn't feel like something that Natalie is obviously qualified to comment on. But I like the song though and it has a nicely weird organ intro.

5. Jubilee
This is an interesting one because it's a massively depressing song about a "Christian" who might not be the purest of heart because he decides to burn down a dance-hall which allows inter-racial contact - "black hands on white shoulders, white hands on black shoulders - dancing, and you know what's more". And as the song progresses his mental state gets more and more agitated and the music matches it well, with all sorts of angular strings involved. All in all, it's a very well composed and quite disturbing song, so I'd struggle to say I like it, but there's a lot to be admired about it. Also, at over six minutes long, it's easily the longest track on the album. 

Lyrically, it's all a bit less subtle and nuanced than In My Tribe (and often a lot more depressing) which doesn't always work for me but musically I think it's an improvement and the production is definitely better. For the playlist I'm picking a mix of upbeat and depressing in "Eat For Two" and "Headstrong", slower and depressing in "The Big Parade" and "Poison In The Well" and just downright depressing in "Jubilee", although I can see the latter being removed at some point.

Wikipedia tells us it's their fourth album (which we know already) and the title was inspired by a fictional game in a children's book. It gives us a track-by-track breakdown - not as good as mine, of course, although I did learn that "Trouble Me" was written for Natalie's father. The critics were mixed on the album but who cares about anything other than what our mate Robert Christgau had to say about them this time - apparently he acknowledged Natalie's "own prosaic prosody with off-kilter guitar accentuating its eccentric undertow" (which I think is him being nice). We also have some commercial success over here to report, with it getting to #18 at the start of an eight week run, making it their most successful album over here - it got to #47 in the US and shipped a million copies over there.

I like this album - it's another interesting step on their journey which certainly shows musical growth, even if there are some lyrical mis-steps imho. But any mis-steps certainly can't be attributed to a lack of ambition - they're aiming high here and I certainly enjoy their efforts.

In My Tribe - the first proper steps on the journey
Our Time In Eden - Natalie's last studio album with the band