Best known, to me anyway, as the stellar producer of The Mountain Goats’ releases Tallahassee, We Shall All Be Healed, and The Sunset Tree, John Vanderslice also steps out on his own once in a while, and this is one of the better results.
Actually, it’s more accurate to say they reshuffle the deck, and John Darnielle becomes a minor contributor, credited here with “editing, expanding, and otherwise improving” the lyrics.
(At the Mountain Goats’ L.A. Troubadour show this past June, Darnielle led the crowd in a Public Enemy-homage cheer: “Tell Me the Name of My Producer!” And the crowd shouted back: “Terminator X!” Except me, because I had just listened to Vanderslice’s “Cellar Door” so I shouted: John Vanderslice! I then felt a little bit like a dork.)
Vanderslice is, like many people on the production side of things, a real musician’s musician (which often means echoes of Bowie), full of tone and texture, sometimes short on immediate impact. The production on Pixel Revolt doesn’t disappoint – it’s gorgeous: warm, seamless, full of tinkling bells, soothing vocals, and layered strings. These are songs of delicate construction and depth, rarely crowded, never dull.
But Vanderslice can be a reluctant singer. The lyrics sometimes lay across the top awkwardly – as on “Dead State Pacific,” which is otherwise moving. The major difference between this and other albums of mournful spookiness is the lack of force of personality, the stamp of an individual across the whole. (I actually heard a Vanderslice album before I knew The Mountain Goats and my first thought was ‘what amazing production, but…’)
The production here is so very good I found myself thinking if only we could pair this guy with a brilliant lyricist, a charismatic frontman, a sparkplug of rock ‘n’ roll passion…i.e., Darnielle. Vanderslice has made a good album here, but he’s also been involved in a few that are great. It’s like a solo Keith Richards album. Put it on, and you friends will say: “Hey, not bad. Do you have Exile on Main Street?”
– Tom Vale
John Vanderslice (Barsuk)