Review Summary: Jaime Stewart shows us why he is one of the most influential artists in the modern world of music
The terms
weird and
bizarre can be defined in many ways in this music world. They can be defined through live shows, lyrics, or simply the musical part of a group. In a way, it’s a good thing for most artists to be lumped in with those words. It draws a crowd, be it for love or hate, and you realize that you have someones attention. The downside to being a weird and bizzare artist is that most people will not understand what you are doing. In the music world of today, most people prefer drive-thru service for their music. That is the fate of
Xiu Xiu. What Xiu Xiu have done since their birth in 2000 has in some ways been exactly what they wanted. It’s so easy to have people like you, or even love you. However, in order to get people people to really hate your music and have them to go to your shows and insult you and throw objects at you while you are on stage (very scary sight by the way), and at the same time have people just fall in love with your music, that’s an accomplishment in my eyes. That is what makes Xiu Xiu so intriguing and interesting.
Fabulous Muscles is arguably their magnum opus. It is also their most accesible album. Jaime Stewart decided to tone down the music a bit more from their more harsh efforts in the past. It is also filled with more pop ambient and some tracks have really been stripped down. Jaime Stewart’s vocals are the attraction here. On
Little Panda McElroy and
Nieces Pieces he is as quiet as a mouse while on tracks like
Crank Heart and
Brian The Vampire he shows the more aggressive side of his vocals. His vocals carry the music and vice versa. They compliment each other and make an impact. The music varies from electronica, indie, punk, and acoustic to create a very diverse and rare atmosphere.
Crank Heart showcases most of these styles and is probably the hardest song on the album. It has a very infectious chorus and a very catchy beat.
Bunny Gamer,
Brian The Vampire, and
Clowne Towne rely more on the electronic and indie style that Xiu Xiu incorporate in their music. It is on these tracks where you can hear that they wanted a bit more of a pop ambient. They are still very experimental in the classic Xiu Xiu fashion.
Clowne Towne has the best chorus as it gets stuck in the listeners head.
The weirdest track on the album is
Support Our Troops OH!. It is a spoken word track with a feeling like you are in a hospital. After the first part and the second part of the spoken word are over, it dives into a chaotic mess. It makes the listener feel like they are in a hospital room and the patient is dying. On
Mike,
Little Panda McElroy, and
Nieces Pieces, the music is stripped down. They use the electronic side of their music to create more of a bare, naked ambient while Jaime is almost whispering the lyrics. While the vocals are splendid on these tracks, the music is where they excel. It has the feeling of desperation and depression which is what its set out to do.
Fabulous Muscles is an acoustic track which is an absolute mess. The guitar playing is mostly improvisation and the vocals follow the same formula as the guitar. The strongest track on
Fabulous Muscles is
I Luv The Valley OH!. It is stripped down and uptempo. What makes this song the strongest is the guitar playing and Jaime Stewarts voice. The guitar playing, while very simple, is very powerful and fits in perfectly with the rest of the track. The vocals are sung in a very desperate, last cry for help manner leaving the listener to feel what Jaime feels.
If Xiu Xiu were a more popular mainstream band, they would be much more controversial on a national scale because of one thing and that is their lyrics. It’s what defines Xiu Xiu. Sex, child molestation, suicide, horrors of war, family incest, and change are most of the topics of this album. In a way, the lyrics tell stories of tortured people who suffer from dilemas and who try to find solutions to their problems and the music helps demostrate the emotions they feel.
Nieces Pieces deals with a person telling another child what he or she is and what kind of family he or she lives with by telling him how their family is full of incest, how they will amount to nothing, and how they will ruin that childs life forever and laughing at the end of it.
Support Our Troops OH! asks a soldier of war if he knew he would kill innocent lives and making the soldier realize that he has been brainwashed his whole life to take orders from someone else. To destroy only to watch destruction and to kill only to see blood.
Brian The Vampire deals with a person realizing that a little boy is being molested by his older brother and his family turning the other way.
Fabulous Muscles is a story of two men who are having a sexual relationship, but while one is in it purely for the physical, the other one begins to fall in love but the other man refuses to pursue something.
I Luv The Valley OH! is the most personal song to Jaime as it talks about his thoughts about suicide and his love of being depressed brought onto him by his family. These are just some of the topics
Fabulous Muscles deals with. There are no happy endings for anyone of the characters.
I can see why people would be turned off by this band. Xiu Xiu is definetly not for everyone. Those who are intrigued should definetly listen to
Fabulous Muscles. While Xiu Xiu are a controversial band in the independent music world, only time will tell how they are viewed among the most controversial bands in music. More important though is what their impact on music in general will be. Once someone listens to Xiu Xiu, they will change their view on music. One thing is for sure though and that is that they will continue to win over and inspire hate from people all over the world. That is an accomplishment on its own.
