People call Trompe Le Monde the first Frank Black solo album, straying as it does from the Pixies' alterna-punk roots and eschewing as it does the barest songwriting contribution from Kim Deal. Under that conceit, this is pretty standard, solid, sophomore album material, as the surfier, more melodic sound of the Pixies' swan song is explored and expanded.
Only the barest vestiges of Black's screamy days remains, here he rises the a creaky caw at best, mostly swooping over crunchy acoustic chords and reverbey electric plucks: this is reaching more for Where is My Mind's buzzy grace than Debaser's hellbent rage.
It's all perfectly good. These are good songs with excellent melodies and enjoyable textures and sounds, but... there's something missing. There's no edge, nothing quite penetrates the heart and barbs into place, everything buffed solo-act smooth. One of the joys of an actual band is that the personalities grate against each other, leaving pitts and pockmarks on the songs, the disagreement assuring that good-enough is achieved without blowing past it into actually-worse just-right. This is exhibit A. Also, man, something happened to Black's voice at some point, he just can't deliver like he used to. Here he sounds like a limp impression of himself,* further undermining the songs impact.
Add the Pixies to the list of bands that just had that magic, too beautiful to live, that just couldn't survive the moment they exploded from 3/5
* and it only got worse, have you seen him try to do the screamier Pixies
songs since their reunion? Yikes double yikes yow. Bad scene.
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