O Brother, Where Art Thou?

For some odd reason, I decided to press play on this disc as I laid on the floor pretending as though ab excercises are something I actually enjoy and don't do half-assed. It had been a long time, but I do know this, I loved me some Cloven Soft Shoe, and here's why. You see, once upon a time in the ultimate Los Angeles an enchantress and four lovely lads came together to form a performance art musical act whose music would have a wide range of influences from Cole Porter to the B-52's to Kate Bush and Tin Pin Alley just to name a few. Calling themselves My Barbarian, this rag tag of actors, scholars, and UCLA grads would go on to release their debut album Cloven Soft-Shoe under the radar without anyone noticing. Said album is truly a stunning and mystical affair, an album in which the majority of the tracks revolve around trying to make it in your twenties/making it as a performer in your twenties. It’s all big kids with big dreams, buying tickets one way from NY to LA, dreaming of “being the first jew-yorican in the Bolshoi Ballet”, while sitting lonely in their apartments smoking a lot of pot. The themes and thoughts on making it in the city is backed by music that is both adventurous and haunting, channeling post punk dance rock with operatic vocal flourishes one minute [‘Dance You Withces (Dance)’] and psychedelic brit rock of yesteryear the next [the fanciful dance inducing psychedelia of ‘Morgan Le Fay’]. In ‘The Upstairs’ the band slows down as lead singer Alex Segade rhapsodizes on life in his spacious one room flat to the beat of a simple drum pattern and heavy keyboard melody. Rats line the walls, vietnam vets rant, masturbation has now become a bore, and the stairs go up, up, up. In other words a whole lot of something is going on around him. The same can be said for the album. While My Barbarian doesn’t necessarily take a kitchen sink approach to crafting their tunes, the incorporation of layered vocals, spoken word interludes, haunting song structures, and dips into various genres makes for one eclectic reflection of growing up actor/dancer/artist/confused trying to make it on your own.

And that is why I must ask, O My Barbarian, where art thou? If anyone has any info whatsoever on this collective, please let a brotha know.

Key Tracks: The Upstairs[still on of my favorite songs of all time], Morgan Le Fay, Secret Ceremony