Categories : Music Reviews, Rock + Pop.
 |
Rating: 3/5 Released: October 20, 2003 Reviewer: Nathan Atnikov |
Ever since 1992, when Gordon was released, the Barenaked Ladies have been trying to live down the tag of comedy band. And when you look back at that album, you have to admit that, for the most part, it was a goofy and childish CD. That’s not to say that it didn’t have its share of serious songs, but it was there were certainly a number of songs that were designed to make you laugh. And there’s one more thing about Gordon; it was great. Never before had a band as musically talented as the Ladies, with lyricists as good as Steven Page and Ed Robertson, take such a fun-loving approach. In their home country of Canada, however, they had to work for the next six years, until the release of Stunt, to live down the dreaded comedy tag. It was then that the Barenaked Ladies exploded in the United States with their hit song, One Week. And the rest, as they say…
Now we land in 2003, with the Barenaked Ladies new album, Everything For Everyone. The Ladies, of course, continue to write great comedy songs that are a blast to listen to, but much more interesting on this album are the songs that really have a strong message behind them. And the closer you look, the more of those messages you’ll find. Unfortunately, the first song, ‘Celebrity’, suffers from being a little over-examined these days. A cutting view of what fame means to the boys, there is nothing here we haven’t heard a million times. The gist of it is that you pay the price of your private life in order to be a celebrity.
Part of what is holding the Ladies back from being taken a little more seriously is their record label’s choice of singles. The first single off of Everything For Everyone is ‘Another Postcard’. A pseudo-rap song about being bombarded with postcards with pictures of chimpanzees on them. Sample lyric: “Some chimps in swimsuits, some chimps in jackboots / Some chimps in hardhats, some chimps who love cats.†Need I say more?
As the album goes on, you notice that there is a long and deep streak of darkness that is embedded in the songs. On the song ‘Next Time’, Page sings about all the things in your life that you are going to do wrong, but “you can always get it right, next time.†One of the most interesting songs is ‘Shopping’. At first, want to dismiss this song as filler, but the more you listen to it, you realize that it’s actually a tongue in cheek criticism of consumerism in North America. Page sounds so sincere when he sings, “everything will always be alright / when we go shopping,†that its hard to notice that he is being cynical. It’s also very difficult to get past the synth-pop keyboards that are layered all over the song, causing the message to get lost very easily.
On ‘Testing 1,2,3′, Robertson openly discusses exactly what would happen if he (and the band) “shed the irony.†It’s cool to hear the band acknowledging that they just wouldn’t be the same if they tried to put out an overly serious album. Then, interestingly, the band comes with what is probably their darkest song ever, ‘War on Drugs’. The song leads us through a woman’s struggles throughout her life, culminating in her suicide. The song is completely devoid of any witty one-liners, as the Ladies resist the temptation to distract the listener from the song itself. Page sings, “Can the very fear that makes you wanna die / be just the same as what keeps you alive? / It’s way more trouble than some suicide is worth.†And for five amazing minutes, the Barenaked Ladies throw all of their conventions and crutches out the window, and write a true gem of a song.
Everything For Everyone is just that. There is something here to satisfy every BNL fan, but nothing other than ‘War on Drugs’ will blow them away. The Ladies succeed in maintaining the status quo, which isn’t a bad thing. With that being said, I’ll say something about the Barenaked Ladies that has been said ad nauseum here in Canada: They have never made an album as good as Gordon. Here’s hoping that one day they do.
