Lupen Crook - The Pros And Cons Of Eating Out
Lupen Crook is a song writer and guitarist who, together with 'The Crooked Family', aims to deliver his unique and often scary take on life. His latest album 'The Pros And Cons Of Eating Out' promised to be his most coherent to date.
The album begins with the highly rhyming 'Fantasist In March', which on first listen could pass for an early Blur song. The words come fast and are delivered with some slight venom. There's a mild hint of John Otway in the voice, nice arrangements and some crazy up beat moments. I must admit, I did find this track difficult to listen to initially due to the ranging tempos and intermittent volume levels.
There's a slight change of attitude with 'Will O The Wisp' which starts with some busy lyrics over keyboard. Again, the tempo is upped and the military style delivery of the backing takes over; the resulting overall chaos drowning out any lyrical message. It all seems too frantic and, to be honest, quite annoying.
'Sleeping Lions' is a moody and angry song, though conversely having quite a memorable sound during the chorus. The anger in the voice and the rants in German make it all a bit too uncomfortable. The musical arrangements here are good and quite promising; it's a shame that these weren't developed more and the vocal attitude turned down a notch or two. The early potential of 'Dorothy Deserves' is soon drowned by more manic vocals and it all ends up sounding a lot like 'The Cure' on speed.
The quiet 'World's End' is a welcome diversion. The volume and anger are turned down and the singing over the gentle guitar allows the listener to actually hear the lyrics. It develops into an indie pop song, complete with a catchy chorus. The nice guitar work on 'Devils Son' is quite good and the song brings the tempo and volume up again; though this time, having more of a 'rock 'background, the angst in the voice seems to fit much better.
The quirky 'Lest We Connect The Crooked Family' is less deranged (at the beginning at least) and is quite a good song though there is a bit of craziness towards the end. The heavy indie rock beats of 'Scissor Kick' are quite good as is the acoustic guitar of 'Pirate's Wife'; the latter be particularly well arranged. Not surprisingly, the darkness inevitably returns with 'How To Murder Birds'; up tempo and a little too off centre and a little too uncomfortable.
There's actual 'singing' on 'Hour Glass'; making a pleasant change from the 'half singing, half talking' that had gone before. There are very good moments on this track, good rhythm and chord structures; the overall sound being much more rounded. The final track on the album, 'Ode To Fucking Everyone', is again, dark and the spiteful delivery of the vocals returns. The anthemic chorus is delivered with anger in its tone, though some of the quieter moments are bearable.
Is he a genius, a madman or something else? The lyrical content of some of the songs are quite impressive, though they are let down all too often by the violent musical arrangements and snarling attitudes. I feel that with a little more imagination, the messages could have been delivered in a more coherent way; a difficult listen.