After Bob's Drive-In, which, in terms of production was quite restrained and minimal, Ornaments sets off in the opposite direction, piling up great car-crashes of overlapping fragments in a production that makes rococo look like shaker minimalism. Playing only drums, guitars, bass, banjo, fiddle, organ, trumpet and piano Bob herds tamed cataclysms of musical debris into the shapes of coherent - if episodic – songs, en route skipping through half a century of recording history. As to method well, you can’t beat a year of work. The CD comes with a beautifully illustrated booklet that includes all the song texts as well as eighteen commissioned drawings by the meticulous fine-artist Joe Mruk. Extraordinary music, intriguingly wrapped...
Bob Drake:
My 8th solo album. Since my previous album had a deliberately stripped-down production, the moment I finished it I wanted to do an "overproduced" album. This was the starting point and general direction for Lawn Ornaments. It is very dense, yet still has a lot of space even in the most overdone passages, as well as some sparser moments too for a little contrast. More organ and piano than any of my previous albums, and features my first-ever trumpet playing, which is sure to please or repulse depending on the listener's constitution. Musically, it continues my attempts to come up with the best songs I can, the sheer joy of playing and singing, recording, microphones, amps...always reaching for that good feel, oh you know, make some good music with plenty of laffs and surprises and thrills of various kinds. The artwork includes the cover below and 16 more illustrations by fine artist Joe Mruk and is absolutely gorgeous so I do encourage you to get the CD rather than an art-less digital download.
Szkoda że Bob Drake wciąż tylko nagrywa albumy solowe. Są one niekiedy nierówne,kilka utworów bym nieraz usunął. Ta jakby "awangarda dla dzieci" bywa irytująca. Wolałbym żeby wyszło więcej płyt Thinking Plague,Hail,5uu's czy także "niepoważnego" instrumentalnego Vril. Z solowych wolę What Day Is It,Little Black Train,13 Songs,Shunned Country czy z okładką dla przedszkola Bob's Drive In. Ale na każdym albumie znajdziemy ciekawe pomysły,brzmienia charakterystyczne dla RIO. W jakimś stopniu każdy trafi do fanatyków 5uu's gdyż jest to prog rock śpiewany falsecikiem(podobieństwa do Yes także muzyczne).