Julian Cope
20 Mothers (Island)
by Chris Adams
Fuck James Brown – Archdrude Julian Cope is, without a doubt, the hardest working man in showbiz. Over the past five years, he has released four major-label records, four independent albums, and two books, with another two on the way. Julian’s career as a wild-eyed workaholic began in the late ’70s, when he was the erratic, acid-gobbling genius who piloted the semi-legendary Teardrop Explodes to worldwide stardom, rockstar excess, and subsequent implosion. Although his solo career has had its peaks and valleys, Julian’s latest incarnation as an anarchistic New Age prophet is both weird and, thankfully, irreverent.
20 Mothers is his fifth double-length album in as many years, and it doesn’t disappoint. Broken into four distinct “phases,” the album is intended as a “celebration of mothers and family.” Don’t, however, expect much misty-eyed reflection about home on the old farm. Instead, you get bizarre, synth-heavy tunes about stone circles, Kurt and Courtney, “senile gets,” and highways to the sun, all written with the desperate vision of a cracked end-of-the-century mystic.
“Greedhead Detector” sports such a cheery-sounding chorus that it requires a minute to realize that Julian’s actually repeating “fuck you” over and over.
Musically, the album’s poppier than his last few efforts, but it generally flies closer to minimalist Kraut rockers Can than to, say, the Hollies. Critics can easily write off this album as a big, pseudo-conceptual art-wank, but I don’t care. Sure, it’s inconsistent – name a double album that isn’t – but its best moments, like the smoking single, “Try Try Try,” more than make up for any odd indulgence. As far as I’m concerned, 20 Mothers is another crazed classic by a guy who ages a lot better than even your best blotter. Buy it and get righteous, brothers and sisters. The millennium is at hand.