In the 70's, I and many a peer were captivated by the music and genius of Todd Rundgren- a kid who exploded onto the scene as part of the group Nazz with searing, psychedelic phased guitar riffs that paid tribute to British Invasion groups like the Who and Cream. Todd went on to rule the studio, playing every instrument, singing all vocals, and putting his musical ideas and idioms to vinyl with an indelible personal stamp. Much to his credit on Rockin' The Suburbs, Ben Folds proves himself to be a modern-day Todd, sprouting beautiful melodies, edgy accomplished instrumentation, and vignettes that paint musical landscapes of everyday life and the people who flow in and out of it. Ben's magic lies in his juxtaposition of sad, borderline-existential lyrics with exuberant, happy melodies. Throughout it all, he weaves the underlying melancholy of time marching on to the beat of the young growing old. The album features eleven tracks, each as inspiring as the next:
The pop hubris of "Annie Waits", handclaps and all- a Billy-Joel-sounding anthem that finds Annie waiting for a friend who, like Godot, never shows.
The up-tempo exuberance of "Zak and Sara"- two madcap hippies who revel in each others musical adventures and their own uniqueness (Zak spelled without a "c" and Sara spelled without an "h"), taking everyone else along for the fun ride
The wisdom of "Still Fighting It", harking back to some of the Beach Boys' most earnest hymns, as a father describes to his son what he will someday feel like to fly away on his own and fight the inevitable sadness of growing old
The 6/8 tempo of "Gone"- with a triumphant flick of the middle finger from the one who was dumped
The emptiness of "Fred Jones Part 2" and what it must feel like to retire, realizing you have to face yourself even more than when you could hide in the comfortable everyday activity of a regular job
The flowing keyboard lines and soaring melodies in "The Ascent of Stan", a tale of the inevitable cop-out of a former hippie who joins the echelon of the institution and finds out why his father was once such a resigned man
The steady bounce and happy melancholy of "Losing Lisa" with its personal reaffirmation of letting go with pride
The wistful waltz of "Carrying Cathy"- the sad recollections of a dear friend after pall-bearing at her funeral, realizing someone was "always carrying Cathy" until her tragic fall to death
The steady bounce of "Not the Same"- the trials and tribulations of a clergyman hanging onto the "one good trick" he uses to help people with their problems
The uninhibited nod to the bass line of Lou Reed's Walk on The Wild Side in "Rockin' The Suburbs"- replete with Weird Al lyrics that mock the white middle-class suburbanites who try to be cool, but not without plenty of self deprecation in lines like "I'm rockin the suburbs just like Michael Jackson did...except that he was talented" and "some producer with computers fixes all my sh...y tracks"
The vaudevillian up-tempo "Fired" with its major seventh chords that seem to tap on the shoulder of the guy who wants to walk away after discovering that "everybody here was fired" and shouting it out to a Motown tempo
The beautiful balladry of "The Luckiest" which, like Big Star's "Blue Moon", borrows the cascading lines and chord progressions of Pachabel's Cannon to express the comfort and fortune we feel to be in the company of loved ones- and the urgency we should feel in letting them know how much they're appreciated before these short lifetimes are over.
Then, just as the album ends, Folds proclaims himself the luckiest, takes a deep breath, and exits stage left...
Good morning, son, you are indeed a bird, flying higher than you've ever done before...
The Genius of Love
It sucks to grow up
