Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

INTERVIEWS, REVIEWS & RELATED ARTICLES

Disc FEBRUARY 23, 1974 - by Ray Fox-Cumming

ENO: HERE COME THE WARM JETS

Eno gives us the first great spray of the year

I was beginning to wonder if the Mad Mekon Of The Moog would ever justify the acres of coverage he's had since he left Roxy Music. After all, since that time, his only effort to emerge on record has been the joint No Pussyfooting project with Fripp - interesting but scarcely earth-shattering.

But now, at long last, here come the warm jets raining down upon us and they're well worth the wait. For his first official solo offering, Eno has borrowed ideas left, right and centre, but since he's fashionable at the moment, he'll probably get away with it as far as the music press at large is concerned. He deserves to, since where he has plagiarised - or shall we be kind and say "researched" - he's done so shrewdly and cunningly tailored his sources to his own ends.

Some people may well complain that the album is infuriatingly frivolous, which in a way some of it is, but I wouldn't squabble on that account because it is genuinely funny where it sets out to be and the music is perfectly valid throughout.

The LP opens with what must be the first choice for a single. It's called Needle In The Camel's Eye and it's a straightforward sunny song with a great hookline and some smashing guitar work. It's followed by The Paw Paw Negro Blowtorch, a gentle and reasonably complimentary send-up of Bryan Ferry also containing some very cheeky synthesiser work.

Baby's On Fire has a lot to thank The Rocky Horror Show for - not only does the tune sound familiar, but the vocal is just like Riff-Raff, a character in the show, who incidentally is the spitting image of Eno.

The last two tracks on side one are OK but not among my favourites, so we'll dwell on them not at all.

The second side opens with On Some Faraway Beach, a lofty chorale of a song, beautifully understated, with a lovely closing verse. Blank Frank has a great lyric, but I don't think Eno loads it with quite enough spite to make it come off, but Dead Finks Don't Talk is a masterpiece. There's a series of catchy little "bless my souls", another Ferry send-up, only this time it's really wicked with two voices used to emulate the man's distinctive jerky phrasing, and then without fuss the track cuts straight into Some Of Them Are Old, which is so closely allied to its predecessor that it might be well taken as part of it. Here there is a beautiful guitar passage followed by a truly magnificent tune, which Eno sings to perfection.

The album goes out with the title track - another good tune rendered foggy and fuzzed with again a few touches of The Rocky Horror Show. Very effective.

Here then, in the second month of 1974, is the first great album of the year. I hope it will and believe it well might make number one.