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Reviews of Hits From The Brittle Building
::Herald Sun Hit Magazine:: Danielle O'Donohue 12th Feb '04
With his former band Snout, Ross McLennan showed he had a penchant
for quirky, unique pop. Not a whole lot has changed with the release
of his debut solo album, Hits From The Brittle Building.
Though his musical references stretch back through Lou Reed and Bowie to the
Beatles, Melbourne boy McLennan also shares a love of dissecting the modern suburban
life with his contemporary peers such as You Am I's Tim Rogers and E from the
Eels.
From the subtle psychedelic freakout of Winterwonderland and the gentle moog melodies of lead single Gifts
For The Kids, to the rockin' blues of Lovestruck, Hits From
The Brittle Building combines the best characteristics of 50 years of quality pop and turns it all into a sound that is completely McLennan.
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Ross McLennan never lacked a pop sensibility in his days as the front man for the sadly departed Snout; rococo keyboard fills and swirls of harmony regularly adorned the trio's Beatles-inflected rock. For his solo debut - the brittle building referred to in the title is a tiny room in his Melbourne home - McLennan has taken what he knows about pop and bent it into a richer, angrier shape.
For a start, there are the arrangements and production sound - layers of guitars that sound like bells, keyboards burbling as if played underwater and off-kilter rhythms. And the quirky, sometimes flip approach employed in the Snout years has given way to a sharper, politically charged world view, one in which he extends his sympathies to John Howard the actor for having to share a name with the other one.
Great, intelligent pop.
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::The Age:: Michael Dwyer 17th Feb
As leader of defunct beat-pop hipsters Snout, Ross McLennan had a groovy suit for occasions like this. Maybe it was just the stifling weather, but he ditched all semblance of window dressing, launching his first solo record in dark stubble and streetwear. He even carelessly surrendered centre stage to his bass-playing brother.
A preference for substance over entertainment value is a hallmark of this bohemian corner of Melbourne's pop scene: neither support acts - treacly guitar janglers the Treetops, in rare acoustic mode, nor golf-shirt-fancying geek-rock trio the Crayon Fields - had much in the way of stage craft. Like those youthful bands-in-progress, McLennan's brand new band the Wishbone Knees was not above ending a song with a crunch and a hasty apology. What he had in his favour, though, was a more mature purpose as a songwriter and the confidence to articulate his lyrics.
Still loosely draped in the trippy musical tangents of '60s psychedelia, McLennan's songs are sharp observations on modern life wrapped in Dylanesque word mazes. The unsettling Motorola threw "free trade" and "free will" into an ominous collage of murderous images. Friday
Afternoon Kids opened with mum and dad sighing over the household budget before slowly drowning in information age ennui.
A highlight of the gig was With What You Now Know, one of McLennan's most sadly beautiful melodies questioning the politics of hatred and our will to deal with it, with boy meeting girl somewhere in the middle. It was about as intelligent and affecting as a three-minute pop tune gets.
Given Snout's evolving personnel in recent years, the Wishbone Knees was McLennan's former band in all but name. His typically sardonic I
Lost My Faith in Sporting Prowess, cheerfully modelled on George Harrison's well-worn Taxman groove, could easily have come from his distant back pages. But the show's epic final selection, Symphobia, joined the dots between euphoric, lava-lamp psychedelia and deftly rolling beat poetry to set a new benchmark for McLennan's craft.
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::Inpress:: Martin Jones 18th Feb
It's quite some achievement to successfully present classic elements and relatively traditional song forms with a progressive feel (looking back, moving forward). It's what The Beatles did so well; no matter how psychedelic they got, there were always pure, rich sounds and strong melodies there to grab onto. So it is on Hits
From The Brittle Building, Ross's first post-Snout solo album; his vocal melodies stand proudly out front with plenty of charisma and the warming, reassuring tone of an organ or bass is never far away.
That's not to say that Ross has gone all straight-faced, vintage retro. Of course not! This is cutting edge man, er dude, er dawg. No, seriously, Ross has mastered the art of tastefully cool, hiphop influenced beats. In fact his seamless home-grown blending of modern drum sounds and imaginative noises with more timeless rock and folk elements has him coming across quite Beck-like, Odelay era. Should I point out some evidence? Oh, how about that utterly winning guitar line over the simmering psychedelia of Motorola? Or, hell, the very first bars of the album in which the drums are introduced with a turntable-like scratch over ghostly twisted barroom piano in Symphobia?
Ross's freedom and ability to weave such delightfully engaging production antics into each song, not as flippant gimmicks, but as essential herbs and spices, is powerful evidence for auteur-ism, for the very talented artists to be left vto their own devices, without the distracting and diluting influence of engineers, producers, label-folk, even bandmates.
The songs' aesthetics are engaging enough, but there's also substance every 13 steps of the way in Hits From The Brittle Building. These aresongs you'll not only dig singing, but dig pondering; Ross's lyrics (and they're all printed (hand-written) on the sleeve) are as nourishing as they are tasty.
2004 is looking like a landmark year for truly great local albums and Hits
From The Brittle Building will be one of the greatest; a significant, world-class release.
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::Beat Magazine:: Karen Conrad 18th Feb
Ross McLennan fans who've been keeping their ears to the ground to find out what he'd get up to after the demise of Snout should be sprinting off to their nearest CD shop to snap up his newest release Hits
From The Brittle Building.
Recorded in a room "the size of a broom closet" in his home, it features 13 original songsthat deal with everything from love, death and the universe to politics and luck - both good and bad.
McLennan's first solo effort recalls some of his best work with Snout and carries it to the next level. One gets the distinct impression htta a couple of these songs may have been kicking around trying to come out while he was in that band, while others are clearly fresh pearls from the oyster that is McLennan's deep soul. As Age reviewer Shaun Carney wrote - McLennan has taken what he knows about pop and bent it into a richer, angrier shape.
Indeed, from the opening track, the sinister and sly Symphobia kicks listeners in the heart lyrically while simultaneously seducing with layered vocals that incorporate moody saxophone (Simon Grounds) and trombone (Matt Ridgeway) work....
....There is something very Beatlesque going on in some of the best tracks on this album including Gifts
For The Kids and I'm The Only Adult You Can Trust. And they ain't those Love Me Do Beatles, it's more the psychedelic Helter Skelter vibe of The White Album
Many of the songs on this album offer political comentary and sound like they were written by a man who reads all the newspapers and believes nothin of what he reads. Check out John
Howard The Actor for evidence of McLennan's opinion of the current Government and Australia's voting population....
....The best thing about the CD is the diversity of sounds
to be found within the compositions. Some songs are delicate and introspective
while others like We're The Devil's Own rock the house with a funky, sleazy
back beat and Still Taking Bets sounds like something Beck will wish he
had written.
Hits From The Brittle Building should find a whole new audience for McLennan and the liner notes included will provide armchair political/psychological analysts with plenty to think about. It is a major achievement for him as a songwriter and as a musician. Powerful stuff.
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::Time Off:: ****Richard Alverez 18th Feb
With a pop sensibility that would make the Beatles proud, McLennan’s first solo outing since his days fronting the often-overlooked Snout is a massive leap forward. Maybe with not as much outward flair as artists such as Beck, McLennan’s genius is just as prevalent but subtler, perfectly demonstrated in opening track ‘Symphobia’.
Still exercising that unmistakable jangle, but equally electric and acoustic this time round, there are Snout moments (‘I’m The Only Adult…’), introspective moments (‘Winterwonderland’), carefree moments (‘Still Taking Bets’) and shoulders weighed down with thought. Backed by a cast of dozens, every song breaks the previous one’s mould, experimenting with McLennan’s own formula and bettering it every time.
This is some of the most refined and well-crafted pop music you’ll find anywhere.
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Ross McLennan, as most people wouldn't know, was once the unassuming frontman of what proved to be the most criminally underrated band in Oz music history. Melbourne three-piece Snout was around for about ten years and recorded four full length albums, all of which were really, really good, much better than a lot of the crap that's around now.
Anyway Snout split up in 2002, and everyone who cared was sad. But then Snout was always McLennan's band, really, and McLennan has always been a bit of a visionary. It was always clear we had not heard the last of him. And here he is, back with a vengeance, with an excellent new solo album to prove it. Best of all, it sounds a lot like the stuff Snout used to do.
A little bit political, a little bit sentimental, perhaps somewhat darker than
previous stuff, McLennan recorded almost the whole record in his house, and played
most of the instruments himself.
Hits From The Brittle Building is a stellar record, filled with those familiar skewed guitar hooks and retro yelps that you'll realise you know and love.
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I was one of many fans who witnessed the last emotionally charged show of Melbourne band Snout in 2002, which brought the band's singer-songwriter-bassist Ross McLennan to the end of an impressive - and sadly underrated - 10 year musical chapter. Hits
From The Brittle Building is his first solo offering. It is a perfect encapsulation of his many stylistic leanings to date and then some. It is catchy pop, swirling psychedelia, political, peotic and powerful but it is a work greater than the sum of its parts, its intricate layers offering more with each listen. Recorded at McLennan's home studio (with a little help from his friends from Snout, the Anyones and Treetops), it opens with two beautiful psychedelic-pop outings, Symphobia and the Beatlesque Winterwonderland, before heading into the first single, the poignant up-tempo ballad Gifts
For The Kids. On more straight-ahead rock-pop songs such as I'm The
Only Adult You Can Trust, the infectious spectre of Snout looms large.
While Snout was wonderful, McLennan solo is stunning. Hopefully, this time the world is listening.
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One wonders whether McLennan, for a decade the mainman
of Melbourne underachievers Snout, can take his breezy pop
to greater heights under his own name. The 13 songs here
are as hook-laden as anything from Snout's back catalogue
and, it must be said , just as derivative (David Bowie, The
Beatles and Donovan come to mind).
He's lost none of his enthusiasm for Beatlesque embellishments
- a John Lennon-like rant on Motorola, a George Harrison
style guitar motif on Winterwonderland. He even combines
two of his favourite sources (the Fabs and the Jam) on the
deliciously poppy We're The Devil's Own and I
Lost My Faith In Sporting Prowess. However, there's enough originality
to support the influences, with infectious keyboard figures
and cool drum loops underpinning McLennan's sharp lyrics,
as on the track John Howard The Actor:
My sympathies go out to John Howard the actor/his nomenclature
messed up under history's tractor.
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::MX:: *****Con Sarazen 26th Feb
The ex-Snout main man's pop debut includes biting wit,
depth, infectious tunes and insists on repeated playback.
Playing every instrument (with a little help from his friends)
and recorded in his home, this has a sprinkling of Donovan,
a hint of '70s Bowie and a healthy dose of Beck.
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He's a funny old fellow, Ross McLennan. He always had the ability to dip his lo-fi songs in sugar during a decade with Snout, a band that underachieved through little fault of its own.
Sometimes those pop hooks were big enough to snare, if you stopped long enough to listen. At other times, it was the quirky, if not downright odd twists that caught your attention and made you smile.
Yet as well as the sweetness, there was often a tart after-hit in those songs, usually when the lyrics took a turn towards the unexpected.
In other words, McLennan had the makings of our own version of Robyn Hitchcock, that eccentric but brilliant natural descendant of Syd Barrett and Paul McCartney, or maybe Beck. Luckily, McLennan's first solo album confirms those impressions and builds on them.
Here is an album that can veer from utterly charming yet with a wicked heart, to sharply spiked, but with a soft, almost delicate centre.
For example, Friday Afternoon Kids sets up a Beck-in-acoustic-mode sound, and you half-expect a casual tale told in world-weary tones; but instead, it's a story of poverty that stings without trying.
We're the Devil's Own has that toe-tap country feel the Beatles used to give to Ringo's songs, but it starts off, "Mr Genocidal at the school recital/ Smiling on benignly, kindly/ While Satan's child is playing a sunflower".
Elsewhere, there are cogent politics and plenty of spot-on observations that suggest he does a lot of people watching.
But, hey, even if you're not paying attention to the details, you can be utterly captivated by the stilted pop of Still Taking Bets, and mesmerised by the slow-reveal psychedelia of Symphobia.
Or you can groove on the way he regularly reminds you of Grant Lee Buffalo, although without the heart-on-sleeve romance of Grant Lee Phillips's band.
Nice work all round, really.
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Loves pop music, does our Rosco. The good stuff, not the bad stuff. You can tell this by the smart, sharp lyrics he marries to his smart, sharp pop songs for smart, sharp listeners. From the Beatles to Bowie, via vintage Powderfinger and You Am I, McLennan swaggers through front-bar rockers complete with clap-happy beats (Still Taking Bets), organs and backshed orchestration (Fri. Afternoon Kids). Not bad for a debut album, although McLennan is the former frontman of beloved Melbourne outfit Snout.
Blending the best of bedsit observation with choral pomp (What Kinda Friends Are We?) and political punches (John Howard the Actor), McLennan's one of those dudes who can take everything you've liked before, and refire it as a smart, sharp package.
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Who knew? For a decade Ross McLennan led Melbourne band Snout - offbeat approaches to the usual '60s references a specialty - but their songs didn't connect outside the core of true believers on the indie circuit.
Snout called it a day in 2002, but this home-recorded, mostly self-played debut solo album demands a reassessment of McLennan's creative gifts.
It's quirky - songs called I Lost My Faith In Sporting Prowess and John Howard The Actor probably won't win drive-time radio spins - but Brittle Building is chockers with effervescent pop-smithery.
Imagine Beck on a serious Bowie/Bolan/Beatles bender. It's that good.
Symphobia establishes the territory, with its striking imagery and spoken-word delivery (see rap and poetry can meet), sailing proudly on a tide of trippy drums, eerie choirs and Bowie-esque sax, while Gifts For The Kids plays out like some long-lost psychedelic-pop tune from Donovan.
Yet in 2004 Brittle Building carves out a space of its own: arty, uplifting, bubbling with ideas.
And if we can come out in our thousands to investigate Beck and Flaming Lips, there's no excuse not to check this out.
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While now-defunct Melbourne band Snout certainly had more than
a few musical moments that made you go "ooh, that's rather good", Ross
McLennan's solo debut is so thoroughly excellent you wonder
why he didn't step out on his own a lot sooner. Few artists
have taken such a familiar
set of influences (Beatles, Who, Kinks, psychedelia, Bacharach,
Dylan) and ended up with something original, but McLennan's
innate knowledge of pop songcraft (along with his distinctive
vocal delivery)
somehow
turns all reference points on their head. Marvel at Symphobia's woozy
piano, Strawberry Fields mellotron and whispered vocals,
thrill to the Snout-esque rave-up I Lost My Faith In Sporting Prowess or
simply frock up in your Carnaby Street finery and swing
like London to What
Kind Of Friends Are We. Packed with mind-boggling arrangement
touches, Hits... is one of the best advertisements ever for
making records on
your own at home.
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Former Snout frontman and bassist Ross McLennan returns from his day job to give us his first solo record - solo in the true sense of the word, where every instrument, every sound and every production technique comes from his hand. Well, apart from a few vocal passages and a bit of classical instrumentation courtesy of the Anyones' Pinkerton brothers; but it's still more solo than the average Alex Lloyd record.
And how does he fare without much help from his friends? Quite well, actually.
It's easily his best record since Circle High And Wide (1997), and possibly even better than that - more interesting, more ideas based and with even more of that inimitable McLennan personality. First track Symphobia gives us a taste of his spoken word attitude (think Got Sold On Heaven), before the '60s psychedelic movie soundtrack of Winterwonderland. First single Gifts For The Kids, perhaps a reference to his current career working with high-school students, not only gives more of that spoken word magic but has an undeniable groove to it, the sort that doesn't even need to try to make you want to dance.
Other highlights from the thirteen track CD of glory include the minute and a half I'm The Only Adult You Can Trust, the absolutely brilliant Motorola (with a shouting chorus to die for) and well, just about the whole bloody thing, really! Lyrically the honours go to closing track John Howard The Actor- so true, so true...
Essentially Ross McLennan is to Snout what the Titanics were to Custard - same story, but with a few more twists and turns, a few more interesting developments and more dynamic characters. Stupidly good.
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The album title is a wordplay on the Brill Building, the New York song factory from which teams such as Goffin-King and Mann-Weil produced a parade of hits. But Ross McLennan, former leader of Melbourne trio Snout, has more than a touch of the classic, eclectic songwriter about him. He's obviously enamoured with The Beatles, circa their jangled, psychedelic Revolver/Rubber Soul era. There's also something of Robyn Hitchcock's dry, elastic delivery in his vocals, and brushes with Beck and the Eels in his inventive use of dropouts, compressed sounds and droll wordplay. But it's not pastiche. The window dressing decorates some fine songs, from the spooky something moving in the backyard refrain of Symphobia to the closing John Howard The Actor, possibly the least bombastic protest song ever written.
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