Marion

This World and Body (London)
by Chris Adams

You can’t bullshit me – yeah, I remember you. Yeah, you with the brown corduroy flares and the stained Boss Hog t-shirt. I remember like it was yesterday, so you can quit the act. Harvard Square, by the Kiosk, 1985. You were draped head to toe in funeral black, with Joy Division chalked on the back of your biker jacket. I admired your pointy suede boots, and you taught me how to tease my Mary Chain mop to its proper elevation. We even shared your eyeliner, remember? Oh, don’t look so embarrassed – you still have a soft spot for those days and you know it, so chill.

Once you complete the apparently massive task of getting over yourself, you might even sum up the guts to check out the debut album by this new British group, Marion. Yeah, I know, it’s a crap name – I mean, what next? Laverne? Edith? Thing is, the album is actually pretty damn good. It’s up to its overcoat in all that stuff we dug about early ’80s anglo-pop. Aww, quit rolling your eyes – remember the shivers down your spine when you first heard a vocalist whose ridiculous, delicious mannerisms perfectly mirrored the anguished intensity of the black quagmire of your soul – especially when you were out of hairspray? Don’t you recall the massive thrill you got when you heard those toms pounding headlong into the chilly, existential wind? Or how about those brittle guitars slashing their way into the tortured convolutions of your disaffected disposition? Oh yeah, it’s all here.

Sure, the actual songcraft could use a little work, but what the hell? Marion are super-young, and, after all, this is only their debut. I mean, it’s about as good as Radiohead’s debut, and look how far they’ve come. And hell, there’s nothing wrong with a little nostalgia. Huh? You don’t wanna remember all that? Whaddaya mean ya just wanna feel ‘blank’? Just ‘nothing’? Shit… look, I know you’re having trouble getting over your habit, and I’m aging poorly and everything, but I still remember when we kissed on the Boston Common. It was so sweet, so innocent. Ten years later, and I still haven’t forgotten – isn’t that sad? Whaddaya mean ‘whatever’? Look, I already told you I don’t buy that trip. Just forget I said anything. Anyway, I gotta split. Maybe one day I’ll run into you again – by the Kiosk.