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Combover Beethoven
maniacs
The title track from Maniacs begins with a poem. "You and I, we were of the same first clay" - then the drums begin. Between the pulsing synth and the steady groove, you almost don't notice that what you're being served is tantamount to Scripture.
You and I,
We were of the same first clay
Before we breathed,
Before dust, butterflies,
Orchard shade,
Da Vinci, Chopin, Faraday—
Those vapour notes that swirled and seethed.
We, the bubbles curled with colour,
Watched the melody of elemental scars
Tear blank spaces
Into armour and angry faces.
How soon we claimed the Moon and bothered Mars.
How strong the wanton singalong.
If that’s not enough to convince you to spend some time getting to know Combover Beethoven, I’m not sure anything else I could say will do the trick. Still, there’s plenty to say.
“Sunday Best” from Borders (2024)
“Big Machine” from Lonnie and Donnie (2024)
“Born to be older, born to be dead, born to be afraid of everything inside your head" intones drummer / vocalist Unit, clad in his preferred armor of static and reverb, over the lumbering post-apocalyptic soundscape of “Chain”.
In the lead single "Moving Target", the stage has been set for another era of atrocity. "We let it swing too far, because it's who we are".
Like the debut album Borders, and the EP Lonnie and Donnie that came between, Maniacs is about the rot spreading through the foundations of our civilization, and the sins we commit against one another.
But on Maniacs, much of the focus is turned inward, to the human frailties at the root of it all.
Fear is something of a main character here. Pull the hood off our greed, our selfishness, our violence, our exclusion, and most of the time the face we see is that of fear. Fear that we will be replaced or outclassed by “younger chaps with stronger backs” … or that an allegiance to truth or decency will leave us vulnerable … or that we won’t be able to function if we indulge the part of us that “feels the whole wide universe”.
And who are we? Here we arrive at "Maniacs" and that astounding poem that answers the question.
The rest of the song is an intoxicating tug-of-war between a tight, driving beat and a loose, sultry vocal. The melodic sensibility and restraint here feels hard-earned; the level of skill belies the maturity of years of experience.
"One Time On The Swings", in addition to being a brutally efficient gut-punch of a song, is the perfect example of Unit's polemic style - a paper-thin veil of wry detachment, hardly obscuring the howling despair and righteous outrage of the text. Shrugging his shoulders while pounding on the table. It's a tight needle to thread but it’s wildly effective.
This superpower is put to good use on “Counting’s For Nurds” as well. “Nurds” is going to get tagged as an anti-Trump song, and it certainly contains some spectacular couplets to that end. But we’re also still playing with fear. Has anyone ever looked at these Alpha Male guys and not seen a terrified little boy shining through?
"Is it the pride of the last man standing, or the loneliness of the one who's left behind?" goes the refrain of “Last Man Standing”, written and sung by the group’s primary instrumentalist, Tank. Just in case you thought this group only has one masterful writer. This ability to reveal, in a turn of phrase, the relatable frailties behind our ugliest facades, it's expert-level songcraft.
By the time we reach “Morro Bay”, the band is firing on all cylinders - the music evokes the climax of some cop movie from the 80's as Unit rattles off a handful of bleak, recognizable miseries. The wave breaks into a cascade of manic synth and angry guitar, and eventually fizzles away, but it’ll be quite some time before you stop muttering to yourself “this is the state we chose to live in”.
Maniacs is a masterclass in building tension. Emotional, existential, musical tension - they're all through the roof by the end. If there’s anything to criticize on this record, it’s that the tension never fully breaks.
But the world of which this record is a witness is roiling with unresolved tensions, and there's no release in sight for any of it. This is the state we chose to live in, and why shouldn't we have to sit with that?
Maybe Combover Beethoven is just extremely in touch with their muses, or maybe it was a deliberate choice to leave us stewing in the tension. Maybe that’s why it sounds like Unit was smiling as he muttered “cheers” during the final moments of “The Wrong Ones”. As if to say “I know, but we’re in it together
Got myself a shopping cart with 3 good wheels… a space under the bridge my wonderland
Borders (2024)
Earlier in the record, the song “Child” begins with the question: "If I could tame my ways, would we get better days or worse?" It’s a stark moment, because it feels uncharacteristically personal - like the “we” isn’t the listeners, or society, but rather the people who share a home with the narrator.
A raw sensitivity to suffering and injustice plagues a lot of artists, and this weighs on the people who love them. Without it, we’d have less art that moves us to cry or fight or rejoice. But the cost is steep.
"At sixty, they've fixed me" says the narrator in "Numbers", an enigmatic little poem that reads like Shel Silverstein five whiskeys deep on the cusp of an existential crisis. One can't help but wonder if this isn't the ballgame - hold the inner child, or end up fixed. Fixed either by becoming numb, or by giving into the fear and becoming one of the angry men outside.
for every person there is a worse one, that is the curse son… we are the trouble, it seems
Borders (2024)
We have a glut of “art” nowadays that serves essentially the same function as sports - to provide a distraction, something trivial we can talk about at parties. The Big Machine is selling nostalgia, satisfaction, and sick beats. And there’s a place for all of it - nobody can sustain being raw and trembling 24/7.
But too many of us have cut anything deeper entirely out of our diets. Somebody has got to stand on the wall and cry out for mercy, for justice, for peace, for change.
We may have to wait for the catharsis, both from the real world, and from Combover Beethoven. Luckily, they work fast, and a third album is already underway. In the meantime, thank goodness there are still people crying out in the wilderness, on behalf of us all.
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