April 9, 1998
Violently surreal, willfully bizarre, swinging with a lunatic's zeal, Trout Mask Replica is an avant-garde masterpiece. Be fully warned: this is not music for everyone. It's probably not even for anyone, but some of us freaks have slipped through the cracks of sanity and learned to groove on Beefheart's frayed, gritty poetry and reckless experimentation.
Most listeners (myself included) will likely find this album defiantly unlistenable - at first. But Beefheart's deranged sound slowly reveals itself to be much, much more than simple weirdness. Acknowledging no boundaries of genre, Delta blues and funk and free jazz and beat poetry all fuse into a gorgeous dissonance. Music this dense and rhythmically chaotic is either the product of willful musical ignorance or stunning, studied craft. Trout Mask Replica is clearly the latter.
Beefheart carefully scripted and oversaw every aspect of this recording, rehearsed over a year, which makes the outcome all the more amazing. Some songs show each member of the band playing in a different time signature, their rhythms interlocking briefly and scattering like overlapping sine waves. His voice, too, is a marvel - growling like Tom Waits or shrieking like a woman, his range and emotion are overwhelming.
Like his mentor Frank Zappa, Beefheart accomplished that rarest, highest peak in art or life: the wisdom of experience tempered with the sensibility of a child. Proof of this is simple. If you don't "understand" this album, play it for a six year old and they'll explain it to you. To a child's open acceptance of the bizarre and appreciation of offbeat humor, Beefheart adds the skill and focus of age. The melodies reflect this - sometimes catchy and singsong with absurdist lyrics, sometimes mystical and damning, sometimes just glorious atonal skronk. He plays with words and sounds with a fervor that is inspiring in its vast sweep. No dank corner of the bizarre is left unturned, no phrase too odd not to be sung with conviction.
I trust I've used enough variations of the word "odd" to make you wary. You should be. But odd doesn't mean deliberately offputting - just because it's boldly wacky doesn't mean it's bad. On the contrary, Trout Mask Replica is above all fun, a musical experience quite unlike any other you've ever heard. Those looking for an adventure will find enough territory here to explore for years. "Moonlight On Vermont" alone will blow your mind - this album is an inspired, unearthly treasure.
- Jared O'Connor
glorious atonal skronk