Album Review: The Idler Wheel...

The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do by Fiona Apple (Clean Slate, Epic, 2012. 43 minutes)

Born in New York City, Fiona Apple is a singer-songwriter and pianist. Apple first gained notoriety for her debut album, Tidal, winning a Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. The Idler Wheel… is Apple’s fourth studio album.

Instability 

I can’t say I’ve known a truly unstable person and I want to be careful about labeling Fiona Apple as such—I don’t know her and it would be rude to assume. But, I imagine friendship with such a person would be a roller coaster. Words might be volatile; you’d walk on pins and needles. If this person told you they were trustworthy, would you trust them?

Again with the reminder that I don’t know Fiona Apple, I’ve found her lyrics to signify someone with a screw loose. I love her honesty but she seems like an erratic person.

In her latest release, The Idler Wheel…, Apple continues to write with a bare honesty unmatched in the world of pop music. Melding jazz, alternative rock, and some new electronic flourishes, The Idler Wheel… might be Apple’s best.

A Fight with Her Brain 

The album opens with “Every Single Night”, a jazzy single with Apple’s neuroses in full effect. She sings,

“Every single night / I endure the flight / Of little wings of white-flamed / butterflies in my brain / These ideas of mine / Percolate the mind / Trickle down the spine / Swarm the belly, swelling to a blaze / That’s where the pain comes in / Like a second skeleton / Trying to fit beneath the skin / I can’t fit the feelings in”

Through all of this tension both musically and lyrically, Apple sets up an aggressive chorus where she croons,

“Every single night’s a fight with my brain”

Everything about The Idler Wheel… unsettles. In particular, “Jonathan” stands out with its tense piano chords and boxy counter melody. Nothing about the song adds comfort to the listener.

Similarly, “Left Alone” waddles along with an unsteady chord progression. The song has energy but it feels like a tipsy sort of energy—the kind right before a blackout after a heavy night’s drinking.

The Outside Looking In 

In “Periphery”, Apple continues expressing her doubts about life and promotes herself as an outsider. She sings,

“Oh, the periphery / I lost another one there / He found a prettier girl than me / With a more even-tempered air / And if he wants her, he should get her / Cause I think he thinks she’s worth it / And maybe they’ll move from the periphery / Buy themselves their own plot of land / And I’ll care in a different capacity / I’ll just be hoping he makes a good family man”

Acting the jilted lover, Apple sings with her heart on the page and the music funnels her feelings into an agitated state.

With Music to Match 

The end of the record, however, shines the brightest. With odd percussion and even stranger chord progressions, “Anything We Want” continues the theme of unsettledness.

Over a discordant-then-resolved progression, Apple ponders,

“My scars were / Reflecting the mist in your headlights / I looked like a neon zebra / Shaking rain off her stripes / And the rivulets / Had you riveted / To the places that I wanted you to kiss me / When we find some time alone / And then we can do anything we want”

Perhaps most impressively, Apple composes a catchy chorus over the strangest chord progression. While the first two chords represent standard pop, Apple runs off the charts using augmented chords and strangely placed sevenths.



In sum, the song feels catchy-yet-off.

Is Everything Alright? 

Finally, Apple concludes The Idler Wheel… with “Hot Knife”. With syncopated a capella lines, she sings about a volatile relationship between male and female where each person is butter to the other’s hot knife. Lyrically, the most interesting part of the song occurs toward the end of the tune. Built over a cinemascope of lyrics, Apple suggests,

“You can relax around me”

Perhaps she means it in an ironic way but I find it fascinating how Apple spends the entire span of The Idler Wheel… introducing the listener to the wide scope of her neuroses and yet the last thing she tells us is that we can relax around her.

In her liner notes, on stage, and in interviews, Fiona Apple has presented herself as quite the iconoclast. In The Idler Wheel... she continues to promote this notion, yet she asks us to relax around her? Such a turn in lyrical narrative interests me. I continue to enjoy Apple’s art and if I must relax to hear more, relax I shall.

The Idler Wheel… is an excellent contribution to Apple’s discography—perhaps even her best. If you like singer-songwriters, difficult music and lyrics, or interesting characters, check out Fiona Apple’s The Idler Wheel...

Verdict: 4.5 out of 5

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Posted by: Donovan Richards

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Book Review: Gods Without Men

Gods Without Men: A Novel by Hari Kunzru (New York: Random House, 2012. 386pp)

Hari Kunzru (b. 1969) is a British novelist and journalist. He is most known for his novels The Impressionist, Transmission and My Revolutions. He holds a MA in Philosophy and Literature from Warwick University. He currently lives in East London.

The Beauty of the Desert

“Dans le désert, voyez-vous, il y a tout, et it n’y a rien...c’est Dieu sans les hommes” (8).

Translated: “In the desert, you see, there is everything and nothing...It is God without men” This quote summarizes the feeling of the novel. Kunzru sets Gods Without Men in the desert, and if you’ve ever spent time in one, you may understand why. Sitting alone in a desert, any desert—especially at night, it is easy to let your mind wander, to start to ponder the meaning of it all. There is something unequivocally poignant about the desert, something that makes you realize how small you are.

A Kaleidoscope of Characters

Gods Without Men brings the reader into the consciousness of several characters, spanning several timelines. The reader befriends a dissolute British rocker, a hedge fund executive, a UFO cultist, a homesick Iraqi teenager, and the historical character Honoré de Balzac, whose quote is above. Included in the list of characters is also a deity, Coyote, who is a prankster popular in many Native American Tales. Using this kaleidoscope of characters, Kunzru illustrates that both the universe and a narrative isn’t all about one individual, but rather about many. Juxtaposing the large cast against the desert, he certainly makes his point.

A Family Vacation

The Pinnacles (Photo by Tony Hoffarth)

The main characters, however, are Jaz and Lisa Matharu and their autistic, four-year-old son, Raj. The couple leaves their New York City home in the hopes of a vacation to the Mojave desert aiding their troubles. Jaz, especially, is in need of reprieve, as he has begun to have fantasies of casually killing their son. Fed up with his autism, endless bouts of screaming, and irritability, he’s reached the end of his rope.

“He picked him up and slung him under one arm like a parcel. Raj began to scream properly, the full amplified monotone. For a moment Jaz fantasized about throwing him into the pool, watching him sink to the bottom. His angry face disappearing under the rippling water, the silence afterward” (63-64).

While looking at the rock formation, Pinnacles, Raj disappears. The pinnacles have been known to exhibit strange phenomena, which is why religious zealots, UFO cultists, and Native Americans all paid close attention to the place.  

Somewhat miraculously, their son returns, after a long and chaotic search. The media begins paying attention to this little part of the desert, causing considerable hell to the now reunited family. Raj, however, somehow has recovered from his autism upon his return. Jaz can’t bear to not know what happened to his son and why he is better; he doesn’t believe it, and suspects foul-play. He wonders if Raj was abducted by aliens, or worse, something supernatural.

“‘I can’t put a finger on it. It’s as if—as if something’s wearing his skin’” (365).

Lisa however, is just happy to have her son back.

“The lesson she’d learned (this was another part of the work, to see what had happened as a lesson, as something from which she could gain, instead of a wound that went almost to the bond and would probably never heal) was that knowledge, true knowledge, is the knowledge of limits, the understanding that at the heart of the world, behind or beyond or above or below, is a mystery into which we are not meant to penetrate” (353).

A Larger Narrative

Photo by Kevin Dooley

Kunzru embraces a wide and diverse cast of characters in order to further the point that the focus isn’t the characters but rather the setting. Like an ancillary character says in the novel, the goal is

“to be part of something bigger than [oneself]” (161).

The narrative of a family losing and regaining a son is only augmented by the cast of characters. It shows that the anchor of the story is the Mojave, not the characters themselves.

Overall, I found the book to be exhilarating. At first, I found the large cast of characters to be incredibly confusing. But, once Gods Without Men got rolling, so to speak, the larger narrative was fascinating. It certainly helped that the backdrop of the desert was always consistent. Kunzru does a marvelous job of transporting you to The Pinnacles, and the vast expanse of the desert. He gives the reader an amazing experience, perhaps forcing them to ponder the meaning of it all. If you’re a fan of Jennifer Egan, or novels of the sort, you simply need to read Gods Without Men.

Verdict: 4 out of 5
What do you think? Did you enjoy the novel, or did you find the plethora of characters to be too confusing? Do you enjoy the desert? Does it make you feel small? Share your thoughts below.
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Posted by: Andrew Jacobson


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