Okay
is the work of Fremont, California’s Marty Anderson,
a unique and incredible talent whose approach to composition
is akin to a kaleidoscope run through a distortion pedal.
Marty’s previous output for small labels like Frenetic,
Temporary Residence and 54-40 Or Fight have earned him a small
but devoted following. After two albums fronting the band
Dilute, two collaborating with Kenseth Thibideau (Pinback,
Rumah Sakhit) as Howard Hello and a collection of older solo
material under the name Jacques Kopstein, Marty created the
Okay persona, bent upon shaping his more experimental inclinations
into pop songs.
Marty has a chronic stomach disorder, a rare strain of a not
uncommon (yet no less unfortunate) disease which confounds
his physicians and keeps him somewhat confined to his home
and hooked-up to an I.V. almost daily. The disease (a rare
form of Crohn’s) had been under some control in the
past, but during what would become Dilute’s last tour
in late 2001, things took a turn for the worse. Utterly housebound
in his Oakland apartment and destined to packup his home studio
and move back into his parent’s home in Fremont, Marty
set to work on his new solo effort in 2002.
Outside, the world had become far more chaotic. In his own
life, a long term relationship was coming to an end. America’s
role in the world had changed. Marty’s role in America
had changed. America itself had changed. High Road is concept
record, just as much about personal relationships as about
the state of this country. How does the world stage unfold
to a man, confined to his home, in a state of chronic physical
pain and discomfort? Is patriotism a reflection of the person
or the environment? Is it the personal discovery of the soul
of a nation or a communal denial of it? Love and distress,
hope and despair, helplessness and empowerment, passion and
apathy. Employing the simple and repetitive lyricism of the
pop form, Okay expresses the shockingly unexplored perspectives
of the citizen as citizen, not partisan, in a country at war.
In a political climate where even discussions of unity are
expressed in divisive terminology, he takes the voice of one
man (or another) and sings with the voice of the nation.
‘Where am I? How am I? How are we? Is this right? Why
should I care?’ There is a very honest approach to these
inquiries, the plainspoken directness of a personal dialogue
that never descends into the pandering or didacticism that
pervades nearly every other examination of the subject matter.
Yet even as one dwells on the lyrical content and themes behind
the record, the music that unfolds beneath these ideas is
nothing short of breathtaking. Guitars, keyboards and drums
are layered across each other in a tapestry textured with
sounds of boiling, whirring, burbling, whispering and clicking.
Gentle chords collide into each other and romp away together
like some spontaneous rendezvous.
Melodies and rhythms chase after lyrical content, falling
out of step in composition in order to illustrate theme. A
gorgeous sonic picture is painted from a palette of chaos.
This is three dimensional composition and four dimensional
sound. And then, of course, there’s Marty’s voice.
If you’ve never heard this voice before, you’ll
never forget it. The tendency in describing such a voice is
to rely on thosen handy, easy-to-reach, bottom-shelf adjectives
like "croaking" or "weird".
The truth is that while Marty’s voice is extremely unusual,
it is its qualities of warmth and depth, the suggestion of
an aged wistfulness and gentle humanity, which truly distinguish
it. One thinks of a mute whose heart was forced to evolve
into his larynx to speak. One thinks of deeply personal letters
written on ancient parchment read aloud by the parchment itself.
The voice and music of Okay not only defy comparison by eluding
reference to individual singers or bands: pick any three bands
or singers and you’ll still be grasping at straws. Finally,
there’s the trivial controversy of two albums of material
being released separately (yes, in two packages) yet simultaneously.
Marty’s live backing band may include (based on availability)
members of Deerhoof, Pinback, Lazarus and Tarentel as well
as his former Dilute bandmate and engineer of recent renown,
Jay Pellicci. |
