This is the second studio album from experimental rock and now avant prog rock/jazz rock band black midi. I really became fond of these guys as of late. They’re a fun 4 piece rock band who refreshingly doesn’t take themselves as seriously as most of the other bands I like. And they were on an absolute roll with Schlagenheim. They were nominated for the Mercury Prize (the UK’s Polaris Prize) for this album and now all my friends will hear is “she moves with a purpose” and I will refuse to elaborate on what that magnificent purpose even is. Schlagenheim is currently on heavy rotation, needless to say, and interest in that album actually stemmed from Cavalcade. The song, John L is fantastic and it helped me to see the black midi light. I listened to Schlagenheim first to prepare for the moment when I got to listen to Cavalcade. I thought Schlagenheim would be the lesser album, then it turned out to be one of the most satisfying albums I’ve heard all year. Cavalcade, all of a sudden, had very high expectations, heightened even more by the fine folks of music nerd Instagram crying out in unison that this is the album of the year giving me a severe case of FOMO, as the Internet does. So, after my obligations to Twenty One Pilots were fulfilled, I finally listened to this album, and I quite enjoyed it. It’s nowhere near as immediate, satisfying or easy to understand as Schlagenheim, but it’s still quite a fun, satisfying listen. It’s a far more muted effort in comparison that shows off instrumental virtuosity over heaviness. Production is very stuffing and overwhelming, but it often comes at the cost of vocals getting absolutely obscured. Composition is fun, like I said, if not as visceral as its predecessor. If you’re mad into prog, you’ll like this album a lot more. The lyrics are also pretty meaningful as well, just as they were on Schlagenheim, but are even more focussed on telling individual stories as opposed to a big concept. You’d think this album would be super messy, and you’d be kind of right, but since they’re black midi, they make it work. This album is more of a slow burn, but it balances the hot with shifting rock bangers as well as the cool with beautiful, poetic, dark balladry. I’ve been waiting a while for this!
PRODUCTION
Here’s a hot take right off the bat: production doesn’t do it as much for me. I feel like this time around the sound is muted in comparison to Schlagenheim. I know this is less of an immediate album, but still I wish there were places where this album popped a little more. The instruments are slightly more muffled and muddy this time around and are less punchy. Drums are still pretty punchy though, even if everything else is held back, which is kind of shocking for a band as explosive as black midi. The major thing that disappoints me about this album’s mixing is how low it buries vocals in the mix. I know that this album is supposed to be a weird mishmash of things everywhere, but all those things bury vocals which are often the main melody. The lyrics are cool but I can barely hear them. Geordie Greep’s vocals are beautiful and Cameron Picton’s voice is dejected. I want to hear that so I can gush over it more! That’s the main problem I have with Cavalcade. A seemingly minor issue, but they’re the melody, so they should be on top unless you’re really going for that overwhelming feeling, which wouldn’t be out of character for this album come to think of it (Slow, for example).
There are considerably more effects on Cavalcade than Schlagenheim as this seems like a less straightforward and more of a meticulous album. Of course, you have layering from instruments, with different instruments hanging out in different areas. Strings on Ascending Forth are panning and they add something interesting to the song. The reverb on John L makes for this epic sound on Geordie Greep’s voice around the third verse. “In all the world there’s no escape from this infernal din” sounds exactly like what that line is alluding to, like you’re in this hell world with, well, no escape. Also, he gets a lot more melodic on this album, and the reverb accounts for that perfectly. Speaking of voices, wow, that quiet section of Slow is incredible with the consonants from Picton sounding like ripples in a pond. The overdubbing on top of a deeper Geordie Greep on top of Geordie Greep’s natural speaking voice on John L and Hogwash and Balderdash serves to make those parts a lot more menacing and they make Greep seem a lot larger. Not to mention the attack on both channels on John L with the guitars at the third “da da da da”, harkening back to 953 on big brother Schlagenheim. Also, the slow, drawn out reverb on that snare hit on Diamond Stuff, makes you feel like you’re floating in a slow-motion trance like the rest of the second half of that song. Cavalcade’s production, while it doesn’t have the immediate power of Schlagenheim, it definitely makes up for in little details, and it shows up in production.
COMPOSITION
Composition is far busier and far more noodly on Cavalcade and it’s not as pretentious as it sounds. It’s actually really great, I promise! Guitars are very interesting and they are used for multiple purposes on this album. Of course, like on Schlagenheim before it, guitars can get pretty heavy, and perhaps none so much as Slow with its double blasts in the chorus. Light guitars on Ascending Forth kind of have Stairway to Heaven vibes to them. Those same guitars on Marlene Dietrich are a soft way to kick off the song and provide a rhythmic backbone. The acoustic and electric guitars always mesh together well. The tink-tink-tink sound on Diamond Stuff makes you think that you’re in a dingy diamond mine relating to that Pulitzer Prize winning classical composition about the plight of miners. On the more relaxing tracks, we get that rising sound from the guitars that pulls you into that relaxed state so well. It’s the oldest trick in the West, but man does it work! Bass has a role in this record still, and it’s really rewarding when it shows up. Like Schlagenheim, it has its moments, such as the bassline on Slow, but it’s usually a helping hand to all the chaos of black midi. Drums are always fantastic. I don’t know how he stays on time in that instrumental interlude of John L, or any wacky drum fill he does, but somehow, it always works. The dude’s giving Count Basie a run for his money! But there are some new additions that are more than worth discussing and they really make this album unique in the short black midi pantheon. Pianos are in the mix now, and on John L, they sound quite close to the chaotic energy of an actual Black MIDI piece, as in the compositional technique. We’re getting closer, guys! Not to mention they are beautiful nearly everywhere else. Saxophones also make a notable appearance this time around whether they are a supporting character or the main show. The saxes are wailing on Chondromalacia Patella to add an accent to the wall of noise. The sax lines on Slow are absolutely incredible. I also can’t go without that dinner bell sound on Hogwash and Balderdash.
Cavalcade is cohesive from a compositional standpoint, which is surprising given how chaotic and nonsensical this album tends to be. Needless to say, it’s hard to give this album or any of the songs on it any sort of coherent, cohesive structure, if black midi even wanted to do such a thing. They did have structure, kind of, and it really pays off to give this album a unified, yet unruly sound. Starting with the songs, we get some prog fun early. John L is focused on being the next 21st Century Schizoid Man with its prophetic lyrics (which we’ll get to) and its daring instrumental section. Then we get a pretty conventional pop song in Marlene Dietrich. Then we get right back to the crazy on Chondromalacia Patella, and I personally feel it’s too all over the place, especially at the end. The pretty vocals with hard, noisy everything else doesn’t really do it for me. Slow feels super epic with its rises and falls adding tension wherever they go. Then Diamond Stuff starts out super quiet and bleak before going a more psychedelic route. Then it gets to Dethroned, which brings the energy up, transitioning from the last song, then building up so it gets denser and denser, and finally hitting a massive peak at the end that hits like a truck, but all the atoms in the truck split when the truck hits you, causing a violent nuclear explosion. Hogwash and Balderdash is this song that reminds me of Primus, and it’s pure nonsensical energy. It’s a couple Vine thuds, a well placed FNAF ambient noise and a “bruh” away from a peak Gen Z meme. It’s absolute chaos and I love it! Then there comes Ascending Forth, a softer track where everyone loves Ascending Fourths. And of course, the choruses and catchiest parts are ascending fourths (Am to Dm to Bm to Em). Even the verses are going up to a fourth, but are just coming up short, as if they think there’s something more interesting they could do. When it does deviate from the ascending fourths, it’s like the song is trying to think of something else outside of those damn ascending fourths. It’s all in vain as it returns to those catchy ascending fourths and you’re left sad for the poor guy who had to write them over and over again. So how do you put something this diverse and this crazy together? Short answer: you don’t. Long answer: Cavalcade has a distinct vibe to it that’s muted and jazzy which production helps with. It’s a darker sound coupled with bright virtuosity from everyone. Chondro near perfectly hints at Slow which hints at Dethroned. You’d think these songs sound the same, but they absolutely don’t. It’s just really cohesive AND it’s chaotic. What else is there to say and what else is there to want? Black midi somehow have their cake and eat it too on Cavalcade with a chaotic sound that is also uniquely, almost uniformly, Cavalcade. It’s the most chaotic and bright Cavalcade the world has ever seen.
LYRICS
This album really wants to be different from Schlagenheim and that manifests itself in lyrics. This is very telling in the singers. Geordie Greep is a lot more melodic on Cavalcade and it contributes to its beauty. He has abandoned the squawky, weird vocals that made Schlagenheim so demented, but he replaces it with beautiful, jazz-style vocals when he goes smooth. It’s kind of like a Brendon Urie sound but far more reserved and less in the higher register. It’s the kind of clean vocals that are very pretty, but absolutely not what you’d expect from a band like black midi. But this album does get aggressive, and Greep is ready for that. Instead of screaming like he did on Schlagenheim, he instead opts for a deadpan spoken word vocal style, which is fine, but it’s not as emotionally charged or dialed in as Schlagenheim. Speaking of emotion, Cameron Picton is back, but this time, he’s less punk like Greep, but more dejected. Diamond Stuff is pretty great, but his masterpiece would have to be Slow. Slow is this vibrant piece of music and he doesn’t even have the will to match the chaos around him. It’s not out of laziness or an “oh, alright” bare minimum sort of thing, but more a depressing feeling that perfectly fits the subject matter of the songs that Picton’s singing in.
Speaking of subject matter, what’s this album about? It’s not really about anything. This time, it’s more compositional cohesion than lyrical cohesion, which I’m ok with. I was expecting Cavalcade to be In The Court of The Crimson King 2.0 with John L as the lead single, as that song is similar to 21st Century Schizoid Man, not just compositionally, but also lyrically. It’s a scathing critique of identity politics and nationalism. John L is this cult leader who has all this power over his audience with grandiose claims of good things happening if only they followed him…until he doesn’t have that power anymore. The people turn against him and John L and his friends die a horrific death, only for the crowd to prop up someone else to worship and sacrifice. How many times in human history has that happened? Then we get to the softer Marlene Dietrich, the antithesis of John L. Purity and beauty compared to corruption, and yet it’s so sad. It’s feigning happiness to fit into a pretty world. Chondromalacia patella is a knee condition where the cartilage under your kneecap isn’t smooth thanks to overuse and now it’s painful to move your knees. This song is a poetic description of that, I guess, and it’s like Geordie Greep is reciting curses to your pathetic knees. Did I mention this album gets weird? Slow and Diamond Stuff are quite sad songs. One’s waiting for the sweet release of death and the other is the narrator lamenting how pathetic his existence is. Then we get to Dethroned, the most epic fall from grace the world has ever seen and the person they’re describing is unraveling like the music. Then Hogwash and Balderdash is a daring prison escape and it’s just as fun and nonsensical as the music behind the lyrics are. Both the words hogwash and balderdash are synonyms for nonsense, so there you go. Then you get to Ascending Forth. The closer of this album is this ten-minute epic of a man named Markus trying to create his next masterpiece that will ensure his legend status in music history. But he is plagued with many things in his epic quest to create art. The first is writer’s block, just to get away from those damn ascending fourths. Then once he finally makes something out of his blood, sweat and tears, the general public does not accept anything outside of those damn ascending fourths. So that’s what he writes, curbing his creativity in favour of what the public wants, ascending forth in history, but at what cost? It’s an age-old story of the public not taking kindly to new ideas outside of whatever they’re currently like, which is likely the very thing they rejected a generation earlier. Black midi clearly has a problem with this, since they make music that’s very much not mainstream. In a perfect world, the best art always rises up to the surface and that artist gets the legendary credit they deserve while they’re still alive, but sometimes that doesn’t happen. This isn’t to sound like some Ben Shapiro type or born in the wrong generation type or real hip hop type, but we’ve seen this time after time in the art world. Artists are forced to conform to the trends of the day at the expense of their wildest, most ground-breaking ideas. It’s a shame, but it happens all the time. This is a larger historical issue that black midi is tapping into here, but as for right now, Cavalcade is one of those albums that might not be the most accessible or trendy thing in the world, but it’s a hell of a lot of fun if you want to check it out!
CONCLUSION
In conclusion, music Instagram nerds are fantastic advertisers for things I already want and I have to say that this album was worth the self-imposed wait. Black midi’s Cavalcade is a very fun, chaotic album and while it’s not as powerful and satisfying as Schlagenheim, it diverts its energy somewhere else. That somewhere else is more beautiful, detailed and technical than its predecessor while still maintaining aggression. It starts with production. Vocal melodies could be slightly more pronounced, but beyond that, it’s fine. It’s not as clear, beefy and powerful as Schlagenheim, but it fits the more meticulous and quieter vibe of Cavalcade. Speaking of meticulous, composition is far more detailed this time. They lean towards a more avant-prog and dark jazz band vibe and while the classic 4 piece rock band is firing on all cylinders again, pianos, saxes and brass add something interesting to this record. Somehow black midi again manages to be both chaotic and orderly on Cavalcade with even more stark differences between those two states. The songs are diverse and sometimes bonkers, but it all works together in a structure that sort of makes sense. Cavalcade is as beautiful as it is horrifying and its order is in its chaos, if that makes any sense at all. The singers on this record are fantastic again, but in very different ways. Greep’s going for a softer approach and he’s really showcasing that beautiful crooning of his, while also getting super deadpan as the music gets noisier. Cameron Picton has traded his punk vocals for depression to match the incredibly themes of the songs he got to sing on. Speaking of themes, this album is more focussed on a unified sound than a unified lyrical story, but the individual lyrical storytelling is amazing. I was pretty blown away by Cavalcade and I see myself dissecting these songs and just plain enjoying them for a long time. I may prefer Schlagenheim, but this album is still amazing. Now there is another elephant in the room that everyone was banging pots and pans about and that is this: is Cavalcade the album of the year for 2021? To that I say, “Guys, it’s not even July, can I at least wait until December to make this decision?”. I haven’t even listened to the Squid album, or the Black Country, New Road album, or the Olivia Rodrigo album or the dodie album or the Billie Eilish album that has yet to be released, so relax, guys. I will say that this album is definitely a legitimate contender for that coveted title, and I shall now give Cavalcade the rating I feel it deserves.
I’m giving this one a Light 9/10.
FAVOURITE TRACKS: John L, Marlene Dietrich, Slow, Diamond Stuff, Dethroned, Hogwash and Balderdash, Ascending Forth
LEAST FAVOURITE TRACK: Chondromalacia Patella
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