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| It’s the “release
me” that ultimately makes “Morning Bell” not just difficult
to take but practically impossible to tolerate. Everything depends
on it. Everything else has been leading up to it. It is so gorgeous.
It is so wonderful. It is so authentic. It is so formal. It is so
final. It is so conclusive. It is so sure of itself, so nearly content
with the decision at which it has unhappily arrived. It is held up
by keyboards and guitars that ripple like skin forming on just-boiling
milk, and what it has to say atop its perch is: death would be better
than this. In various ways, this voice has been saying this all album
long, but never with such naked, open desperation. He has stopped
philosophizing and started begging. He has called in those grand old
men of getting what you want, idiosyncrasy and visible anguish. The
artifices under which he has sketched his pain all go transparent
at once. Our man is broken. He knows it. He is pushing away the people
who might get hurt when the real collapse begins. It would be a noble
thing to do if he weren’t so nasty about it. |
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