Pere Ubu – The Modern Dance

The Modern Dance, the first record that can be accurately described as “post-punk”, was recorded in 1976 and 1977, and finally broke the surface of the US underground sometime in 1978. Chronologically speaking, it’s a close thing because by this stage British groups like Magazine and Joy Division were beginning to explore different attitudes and emotions that transcended the pre-adolescent frustrations of the original punks. But Ubu were definitely the first. And no other group had explored urban decay in such a celebratory, squew-whiff, living breathing HUMAN manner. Compare David Thomas’ hilarious Brian Ferry-meets-Kermit-the-frog-on-speed garblings to Lou Reeds deadpan narcotic drawl, and you’ll see how intent Pere Ubu were on rejecting the go-nowhere nihilism of the New York scene.

Pere Ubu formed in 1975 out of the wreckage of Rocket from the Tombs, a garage punk band heavily indebted to the Velvet Underground and the Stooges. Peter Laughner, lead guitarist and sometime journalist had shaped the bands sound, resulting in two singles “30 seconds over Tokyo” and “Final Solution”. Laughner was eventually kicked out, his excessive alcohol and drug abuse having become intolerable. A year later, he was dead. This I think served as a wake up call to the rest of the band, whose subsequent recordings are a dada free-for-all of free-jazz-dub, musique concrete and synthesizer madness. Pere Ubu took the decay and alienation manifested in Laughners death, and the industrial wastes of their native Cleveland, and turned it into a gleeful, absurdist joke.

This record represents Ubu’s first steps down this road, and it literally explodes with ideas. Ranging from the garage-glam cabaret of “Non-Alignment Pact”, the film noir blind alleys of “Laughing” and “Real World”, to their own “European Son”, six minutes of synthesiser hoots, broken glass, scratchy guitar and David Thomas taking it all in with a kind of weird reverence (“Its Home/its Home…”), that comprises “Sentimental Journey”. 

It’s a surprisingly psychedelic record, thanks mainly to Allen Ravenstine’s brilliant synthesizer work. Sometimes a steam whistle, pistons, a platoon of alley cats, or just wind blowing across waste ground, Ravenstine fills the cracks in the music to create an eerie, hallucinatory dubscape for Thomas to run amok in. Incidentally, Thomas’ “singing” is never less than spellbinding, whinnying like a demented billy-goat, emitting nasal squawks and laughing like an over-excited toddler. He peppers the songs with delicious one-liners, (“I coulda made up that joke – Haw-haw-haw!”) and competes with the free jazz saxophones for dissonance. Elsewhere he is quiet mumbling drunken heartbroken lullaby sweet-nothings to the ghost town he just can’t help loving to bits. The humanity and warmth of his singing is only really comparable to Captain Beefheart, or maybe a tone-deaf, Astral Weeks-era Van Morrison (maybe not, but you’ll see what I mean)

But that’s not to say this isn’t a band effort. Ubu were heavily into reggae rhythms and boy this record sure is funky as a result. Tom Herman’s garagey guitar sometimes resembles a robot chuck berry, elsewhere shooting off ringing leads and punk-reggae squalls that are simultaneously crappy and terrifying. Coupled with Tony Maimone’s chunky bass (certainly an influence on Joy Division Peter Hook and countless Brit post-punkers) and Scott Krauss’ drumming (a brilliant hybrid of Free Jazz clatter and funereal Mo Tucker tom-toms), the three throw thrilling shades of trebly menace. Closing track “Humor Me” is a candidate for best ever white boy punk/reggae track, and certainly equals anything by the Clash. Its also one of the best album closers I’ve heard, reminiscent of the Specials “Ghost Town” a spooky, funny skank with a killer bassline and David Thomas being weirded out by some ne’er do wells, evidently pissed off at his capering, while a police siren echoes in the background. The track fades, cue end credits…

Like all things Ubu, The Modern Dance is a record heavily indebted to its surroundings, with the band lost in their own post-industrial fever dream of decay set in a parallel universe Cleveland that offers no escape. But at the same time, this record is a send up, a noir cabaret that celebrates the shitheap the band grew up in, thereby transcending it. Always several steps ahead of their contemporaries, Pere Ubu would consolidate their vision with Dub Housing, (which at the time of writing this reviewer had still not received from amazon, goddammit!), but this record was where it began. The Modern Dance pulls no punches; it’s a frightening, dissonant, chaotic, delirious record, but with beating heart and soul and ear-to-ear grin like few others. Like David Thomas says on “Humor Me” – “Its just a joke, mon!!”