Dirty Three – ‘Love Changes Everything’ album review: a disjointed movie for the mind
THE SKINNY: Money changes everything, Morrissey once asserted—perhaps love only changes where money is spent. That’s a very cynical way to look at things, and the Dirty Three – Warren Ellis, Mick Turner and Jim White – have no time for cynics on their first new album. That certainly makes you want to like the record. Nobody wants to be a cynic, but cynicism is often borne from reality, and as the listener, those two camps clash in your mind.
Love Changes Everything is the Australian trio’s first release since 2012. With it, they create an instrumental ride of orchestral minimalism. Plodding piano, wailing violas and scattered drums endeavour to whisk up weathered memories of outback scenes under bruised skies and eroded by the sands of time. There are moments of clever and creative musicology afoot in this shady world that is no doubt transfigured into magical sweeps by those who love it. After all, love changes everything.
Alas, the smart money (or cynical money) says that the lovers will be few and far between, and when tasked with reviewing such a record fairly, consideration has to be given to the fact that for most people, the music fails to fully grab you enough not to be dismissed as self-indulgence with too much of an impenetrable, personal intent that never reveals itself to the listener. This makes it hard for the music not to be heard as mere tuning-up at the points where that clever and creative musicology falls short.
Stirring scenes of horses and old homes that exist only in your mind are proof that the Dirty Three have superb skill—creating a soundtrack to a movie that only exists in your imaginings. But in moments where your imagination falls short, bewildered by avant-garde mishmashes of sound, you wonder what movie is meant to be playing, and suddenly you’re cut adrift from the record, faced with an unpleasant passage, then you have to work to get back into the picture.
It is a ragged poem of a record, but one of great experimental passages rather than profound and sustained comprehension.
For fans of: David Lynch unplugged, explorations of abandoned places, and complaints from your neighbours.
A concluding comment from a Hot 100 pop producer: “I think what’s happened is they’ve accidentally hit record when they’ve been sound checking, then turned it off just as they were about to play the song.”
Love Changes Everything track by track:
Release Date: June 25th | Producer: Dirty Three | Label: Bella Union
‘Love Changes Everything I’: A rambling load of bollocks that just about becomes a song after three minutes of threatening to do so. Though skilled and evocative, there are more moments where you ask, ‘What’s the point?’ than there are where you feel you’re listening to avant-magic. [2.5/5]
‘Love Changes Everything II’: Maudlin piano stabs lay out a dissonant and fractured melody as dispersed drums provide a tentative pitta patta. Together, this creates an uneasy mystery: new curtains in an old house, a garden swing, all kinds of imagery unfurl from this piece of obscured minimalism, punctured with its mad moments that sound like someone getting a text through at the theatre. [4/5]
‘Love Changes Everything III’: Corse guitar distortion quickly gives way to lush piano, proving once again that you can’t ever settle into expectations from this album. It’s minimalist to an extreme degree and yet somehow crowded with tiny trinkets. The result is, naturally, evocative but discombobulating, like the stillness of a church in the middle of spaghetti junction. [3/5]
‘Love Changes Everything IV’: For fans expecting something vaguely Nick Cave-adjacent, then this is the closest cut. Wistful and western, great planes are brought to mind as wind-like strings sweep over the gentle, resonant guitar, and a sense of story is afoot. But, once more, it is an odd tale to keep track of. [3.5/5]
‘Love Changes Everything V’: The pitta patta that runs through the album heads towards allegretto. In the process, it almost breaks into an orchestral explosion. Alas, the decidedly avant-garde disposition of this collection ensures it is rather more jungled than anything as conventional as that. Things come together, and things fall apart in a manner that some will see as magical, and others will rue as madness. [3.5/5]
‘Love Changes Everything VI’: At 10:15, the finale is the most expansive cut on the record and serves to culminate all that comes before it. It is as sparse as Nebraska, as dissonant and dishevelled as memories, and with great skill, it manages to be musically like little you’ve heard before but too close to mere tuning-up to ever have you shouting hurrah in an emotional sense. [3.5/5]
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