This is the second Go-Betweens album since their resuscitation threeyears ago, and the band's sound is still surprisingly consistent.During their twenty-year existence, the Go-Betweens have been thepedagogues of jangly pop, ably instructing in their art and edifyingcountless bands who have followed in their footsteps but never hopedever to overtake the teacher as would be normal in the course of thementor/apprentice relationship. The Go-Betweens maintain theirmentorship not by any tyrannical stranglehold, but rather by aperfection of pop which other bands seem unable to master (or evensometimes muster). It usually takes me a few listens through to pickout my best Go-Betweens songs from any one album, and this record is nodifferent. In the end, the differences between the songs which I likeand the ones which I just listen to are subtle; they amount to acertain inflection here, a deeper crooning there. What I can sense fromthese post-reunification albums is that the inflections and crooningshave become less intense and less intoned, for whatever reason (I don'tthink it is so much age as it is growth). As a result, fewer songs jumpout at me. The first half of Bright Yellow Bright Orangebest approaches the glory of older releases. "Poison in the Walls" willnot only recall older songs like "Part Company," but can show what Imean when I talk about the minimized inflection: the elongatedpronunciation of "sometimes" is the hallmark of great Go-Betweenssongs, but in this case is slightly less energetic than I would haveexpected or than would have been recorded circa 1984. The surface ofthe next song, "Mrs. Morgan," screams to be compared to Lou Reed, buteven his songs were never so pleasantly lackadaisical as this. Despiteall of its good, this record simply seems too summery and relaxed for aproper appreciation presently. The anxiety of winter frustratingly dogsthe songs on this perhaps prematurely released album. 'Bright YellowBright Orange' implies the setting in which it should ideally belistened to: in the bright sun-filled day of the early summer when thewarmth makes its first cadenced march back into the air, or, if you aresomewhat more headstrong and jumpy, maybe at the falling of the firstspring rain. Read More
