There’s no coming home with a name like mine

Ghost Towns – Radical Face
Always Gold – Radical Face

For all that I adore some of their songs, Radical Face (or really, Ben Cooper, since it’s more or less his solo project) are exceptionally frustrating. The thing that drives me crazy is the constant insistence on delivering only 85%. I say insistence, because it’s quite clear that he’s got an extremely strong sense of composition and construction. The interludes, the meanderings, the restraint – it’s all being done to a purpose. And sure, you can respect someone with such an ear for mood. But sometimes you just want him to let everything free.  this is exceeding clear on his new album The Family Tree: The Roots.

Listen to the bit around 2:10 on “A Pound of Flesh” – the wordless chorus that rises like a jet taking flight. It’s a glorious moment of awakening and joy. And sure, the loud/soft counterpoint provided by the final minute of the song is lovely in one sense. But I can’t help but feel like it also clips the wings of something that could have been truly majestic.

And then you consider the tracks that bookend it. Both are very nice, but they are almost aggressively downtrodden. Again, you can respect the way that it constructs a story. And I do mean story, because this record is imagined as just the first part of a grand three album narrative of a colonial family. And, true to life, he makes every effort to balance the joyous with the mundane, the fire with the ice.

But, but… I can appreciate the scope of the effort, I can understand the way that it produces a monumental payoff when you get to “Always Gold” near the end, when that song’s internal climax is really the climax of an entire movement. But, “Always Gold” is just so good on its own terms that it doesn’t really need that context to get the job done. In fact, yet again my complaint about this song is that it’s got four minutes of a true classic stretched out to fill six minutes. The intro is beautiful, but could certainly be thirty seconds shorter. And once things kick into gear, the acoustic plucking is perfection – especially when paired with an immaculately timed movement between tones. Until you get the bridge around three minutes, which again drags just a bit too long. Given the energy imparted by the rest of the song, having a minute lull in the middle is just a bit of a drag.

This is also the song that best demonstrates his unexpected vocal talents. In absolute terms, it’s nothing special. But when combined with lyrics evoking honest resignation, the plaintiveness is exactly what’s necessary.

I mean, what a way to start a song:

We were tight knit boys, brothers in more than name
You would kill for me, and knew that I’d do the same
And it cut me sharp, hearing you’d gone away
But everything goes away, yeah everything goes away

And for all my adulation, I haven’t even brought up the best song on the record: “Ghost Towns.” If my central concern is that the album feels contrived, manufactured by a self-aware author, this is the one song that completely breaks the mold. The impulse for restraint gives way and he simply lets thing be precisely what they demand. It’s just a wonderful piece of writing and comes to life in a way very few songs can.

But then, true to form, it’s followed by the hopelessly dull “Kin” which almost aggressively refuses to find a tune. It’s like hanging the sculpted darkness of a Caravaggio and hanging it in between the blueprints for your local 7-11. Sure, it may communicate something, but visitors are entitled to wonder if maybe the juxtaposition is really worth it.

For all that I can’t entirely endorse this record, it remains one of my favorites of the year. And I’m going to reserve final judgment until I hear the remaining two records. My basic complaint is that the atmospheric benefits provided by the dull material doesn’t provide enough of a benefit to overwhelm the lost power of the finest moments. But it’s all good enough that maybe he deserves to have the whole project be heard together. If the concept continues to develop, perhaps the gestalt really will be more than the sum of its parts. Anyways, I’m anxiously awaiting the next installment.