Stuck Complacent

Clinic @ Le Poisson Rouge 4/20/2013
Dissolution: The Dream of Bartholomew / Children of Kellogg / Miss You / Tusk / King Kong / IPC Subeditors Dictate Our Youth / Lion Tamer / Porno / Seamless Boogie Woogie, BBC2 10pm (rpt) / Orangutan / See Saw / You / The Return of Evil Bill / 2/4 // Walking With Thee / T.K. / Cement Mixer

Clinic “Porno”

Clinic is one of those bands who are, even by a lot of the people who like them and have stuck with them for over a decade, sorta under-appreciated. To some extent, their consistency is their curse – always good, always interesting, always more or less the same no matter what they actually change about their music. (And they do.) Clinic are an incredibly specific and uncompromising band, and their refusal to budge even a little bit or meet audiences halfway is not a matter of them having no other ideas. Seeing them play live again for the first time in many years, it was clear to me that this is music that is made because these people feel utterly compelled to do so. There’s some kind of spiritual psycho-sexual catharsis going on when they play; it often feels like observing a peculiar, inscrutable occult ceremony.

I got a lot of out of this set, actually more than I would have expected going in. I was particularly blown away by the performance of “Porno,” a song from their very first single in 1998. It’s a creepy, uncomfortable song with a sort of filthy, furtive groove. It’s the most sexual song in their catalog, but it’s not sexy – if anything, it’s the most accurate evocation of sexual frustration in any song I’ve ever heard. It’s all thwarted, unfocused lust blended with feelings of shame and guilt. It’s abstract, but totally precise. They’ve been playing this song for years now; somehow it’s only become more potent with time.

Buy it from Amazon.