“Ice Cream For Crow” by Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - album review

features in: Album Chart of 1982 →Album Chart of the Decade: 1980s →

TJR says

Living way out in the high Mojave desert with his wife in a trailer (“it's good for painting”), the good Captain had his raven neighbours in mind when he came up with “Ice Cream For Crow”, the title vividly contrasting the blackness of a crow with the pure white of natural ice-cream. A lot of work went into the record, including the making of an (excellent) video for the “Ice Cream For Crow” single which opens the LP. Shot in his home desert in a sweltering 114 degree heat, his disappointment at having the work rejected as being too leftfield by MTV was understandably bitter, typifying as it did his long, hard musical struggle of the last 20 years. The high quality brand of blues rock continues with “The Host The Ghost The Most Holy-O”, although the psuedo-funky instrumental “Semi-Multicoloured Caucasian” is technically very good, but does little for me, and another instrumental, “Evening Bell”, is a bit of a throwaway, keeping the overall rating lower than it might otherwise have been. His colourful prose and wondrous titles are as striking as ever, exemplified on “Hey Garland, I Dig Your Tweed Coat” which kinda puts me in mind of “Steal Softly Thru Snow”, recalling some of that Trout Mask Replica chaos, musically and lyrically: “And the rainbow baboon gobbled fifteen fish eyes with each spoon.” Well, I never.

Although not always his genre of choice, and even at that, not always a crystal pure interpretation when it is, I consider Beefheart to be one of the most original bluesmen that ever existed, and on side two “The Past Sure Is Tense” serves as a fine example, taking that slippery Pere Ubu approach to being pigeon-holed, knowingly dabbling in at least 4 decades worth of disparate influence in a bad-ass potpourri of excellence. Much of the same could be said of the other main highlight of the side, “The Thousandth And Tenth Day Of The Human Totem Pole”, six minutes of fragmented dub wonder that would give Lee Perry a run for his money. The beef in his heart was too much with regards to the ongoing struggle, and from hereon he gave up on serving the public via the music business, and would now devote himself entirely to his painting. The world of music would be poorer for it, but at least he went out on an artistic high. John Peel thought it one of his best LPs, and there can be no higher critical praise: “If there has ever been such a thing as a genius in the history of pop music, it’s Beefheart. There never was a greater, not even Mark E. Smith.

The Jukebox Rebel
01–Mar–2019

Tracklist
A1 [04:35] 8.1.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Ice Cream For Crow (Don Van Vliet) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
A2 [02:25] 8.4.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - The Host The Ghost The Most Holy-O (Don Van Vliet) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
A3 [04:20] 5.5.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Semi-Multicoloured Caucasian (Don Van Vliet) Blues Rock / Soul Rock
A4 [03:13] 7.3.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Hey Garland, I Dig Your Tweed Coat (Don Van Vliet) Prog
A5 [02:00] 4.5.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Evening Bell (Don Van Vliet) Prog
A6 [02:38] 6.4.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Cardboard Cutout Sundown (Don Van Vliet) Prog
B1 [03:21] 8.8.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - The Past Sure Is Tense (Don Van Vliet) Proto-Punk
B2 [01:40] 6.3.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Ink Mathematics (Don Van Vliet) Alternative Rock
B3 [02:38] 7.4.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - The Witch Doctor Life (Don Van Vliet) Dubbeat
B4 [02:39] 6.6.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - '81 Poop Hatch (Don Van Vliet) Poetry
B5 [05:42] 7.5.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - The Thousandth And Tenth Day Of The Human Totem Pole (Don Van Vliet) Dubbeat
B6 [02:18] 5.5.png Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band - Skeleton Makes Good (Don Van Vliet) Avant-Garde

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