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You Dubstar fans, you want the moon on a stick, you do. Well you can't have it, but you can have heaven in your ears if this selection of demos from DUBSTAR's forthcoming album is any indicator. I am excited - very excited. The tape I have, courtesy of Steve Hillier and featuring seven brand-new Dubstar demo tracks, is one of the most exciting things I have heard in a long, long time.
Gone is the twinkling, ethereal dreamscape of STARS, but by the same token say 'goodbye' to the lolloping tinsel-town kitsch-spangled let-down of CATHEDRAL PARK. Here we enter a world where every emotion has been brutally ripped apart and then pieced back together with calculated precision, where wide-eyed wonder has given way to the despair of a sunny day at the beach ruined by your best chum copping off with your girlfriend - and now we join the scene as you decide to cave in his face with an axe. 'Oh yes' you cry - 'that's the Dubstar we know and love, all worldy wise and brimming with cynicism'. Well, yes, but this is - somehow - darker, harder, more.. serious. They've seen it all and they know the score, but this time they're not taking any more crap.
From the somber intoned liturgy of THE ARC OF FIRE to the darkly forced optimism of RISE TO THE TOP, the plaintive heart-rending agony of BELIEVE IN ME to the bullish pop of STAY, via lilting balmy nights of sin in I AM THE CRIME to the understated soul-searching drama of VICTORIA, and on to the sheer glory of I DON'T WANT TO DIE ON A TUESDAY, this collection is consistently wonderful.
Most poppy of the bunch is STAY - I would venture that it might be a first single choice, if it weren't for the fact that Food's A&R decisions seem to gush messily from the fountain of madness. Instantly catchy, in a No More Talk-cum-Not So Manic Now kind of way, this is a fine Dubstar bop-fest, lovingly inlaid with gems such as "Lay here in the sun and let Sarah make it better" and chased up by Steve's gutsy growling production that is the hallmark of these songs.
THE ARC OF FIRE could almost be a chant for the masses, a calling to arms for humankind against the death of the earth, an invitation to the moment of judgement, accompanied by an aggressive, determined backing which drives the song relentlessly from beginning to end.
RISE TO THE TOP picks up the devastation left by THE ARC OF FIRE, and decides that things can only get worse. There's a taste of 70s punk simmering away here - in as far as you do 70s punk if you're Dubstar with a room full of synthesizers. The lyrics are those of someone on the brink, the snarled melody gives them the voice of a madman.
BELIEVE IN ME sounds utterly familiar, yet I can't place it - perhaps just a culmination of all that is Dubstar. The lyrics are there - I know I've failed you but I'm only human. The sounds are there, those big melodic hooks sounding like guitar processed with ocean. And the heart-felt appeal of the chorus, mid-tempo and flowing.
The hypnotic I AM THE CRIME gently infiltrates your soul with its swaying, persuasive charms, like the most fluid cobra caressing its prey to death, and VICTORIA is a darker take, reminiscent of STARFISH, but with smudged mascara and smeared lipstick thrown in.
And, finally, I DON'T WANT TO DIE ON A TUESDAY - a carefully considered journey into all the great reasons to stay alive on, well, a Tuesday, with a twist of course.. all set to a jolly West-Country fairground waltz to end the proceedings on an uplifting note.
These songs really don't sound a lot like anything Dubstar have done before, but then they are also unmistakably Dubstar - perhaps they're just more Dubstar than they've ever been. I have a very good feeling about the new album - it's looking to be a triumphant departure from GOODBYE, and a very classy record indeed, a smouldering bohemian pit of life and love and darkness that will leave you breathless.
©1998 Neil Hardie
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