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FIlfE-EIGHT
The Booh Hurse Is A Balm For Wlat Ails
G uitarist Mike Mantione and bassist Dan
Horowitz relocated to Athens from
Binghamton, NY and formed Five-Eight in
late *987. The band established itself as one of
the region's most ambitious and chaotic live acts
and as one of the most prolific, melodic and lyri
cally introspective sc r > r "vriting bands.
With drummer Patrick "Tigger" Ferguson and
guitarist Sean Dunn, the band released its most
acclaimed albums. 1994's Weirdo(Sky) and 1997*s
GasoUna!(Velvet). Five-Eight almost broke up for
good when Ferguson and Dunn exited the band
in February, 1993. Thankfully, drummer Mike
Rizzi stepped in. After nearly two years of work,
Five-Eght finally released its new album, The
Good Nurse on Deep Elm Records. In tyay, on the
eve of the albvra s initial limited release, Rizzi
boasted that the 13-song collection was a "defi
nitely uncompromising departure" and that
Mantione was "writing about stuff here I don't
think anyone else has touched." He was not kid
ding. ^
The Good Nurse, packaged as an old family
photo album (with two spectacular paintings by
Athens artist Terry Rowlett), is a highly unusual
journey: a steadied march through a world filled
with bittersweet childhood memories, dreams
and nighin^ires, familial dysfunction and mal
function, and a reries of severely personal
tragedies and small triumphs. Musically, the
band introduces more atmospheric effects than
with previous efforts (echoes, tape loops and
delays, random back
ground conversations),
and allows the songs to
breathe with a more
subtle approach co
tracking. Most songs
pulsate with dynamics,
often going from very
quiet, building up to
bombastic, and then back
down again. Lyrically,
the album weaves
through an abstract tale
centered around a "hos
pital" world filled with
images of waiting rooms,
surgery sessions, crowded
airports and uncomfort
able family holidays.
Mantione's characters
seem to make one desperate plea after another
for acknowledgment, resolution, forgiveness and
reciprocation.
The album opens with three songs which
segue into one another to form something of a
trilogy. "She's Sleeping" chimes in softly with a
cyclical guitar chord, a slow, swiiiing drum beat
in half-time and warm brass accompaniment
(provided by Scott Spillane of the Elephant 6
contingent). The listener can almost picture
Mantione singing this standing still with his
eyes shut and his head tilted as he laments
about "sketches of family, a family tree that's
gone on paper that's tom and not renumbered."
ihe gradual crescendos of the opener dissi
pate into a low, dissonant jumble in "Rose's
Dream," a pounding instrumental peppered with
eerie slide guitar that kicks in wi*h a galloping
6/8 pattern (seemingly borrowed from that of
Black Sabbath's "Children Of Tfa$ Grave"—no
thematic connection between songs intended).
After the track's o mine us conclusion, the dust
settles into "Off Season," another sparse,
creeping march paced by Maniadfoe's low-octave
vocals and steady drone of eiff&h notes on the
guitar. Bass drums and toms accent in the dis
tance while Mantione sings in an almost trance
like manner about an "angry soft" who "dreams
about healing" and insists that he's "not alone,
not alone."
After the startlingly heavy-handed opening,
the album lightens up a bit with the jangly,
almost psychedelic, "The One Who Does Better,"
an anthem that makes first mention of "the
good nurse and the bad nurse." This song swoops
up and down and glides from verse to chorus
with vocalized "aahhh's" and tambourines
chiming in the background.
"Terminals" continues as another effectively
dynamic anthem-like number. Mantione sings
about the fears of a little boy and conjures
images of a "world too big and cold where people
bring you down with words."
Despite its solemn title, "Requiem" darts and
dashes between heavy power chords and deli
cate, two-note guitar melodies. The valiant
sounding chorus in which Mantione hollers,
"How does it feel... when you're in the dark?/ It
comes as such a shock to find myself down and
out when I tried so hard!"—and this may sound
strange—is somehow reminiscent of the big
chorus in. Mott The Hoople's \mrsion of Bowie's
"AU The Young Dudes."
If the first half of The Good Nurse carries on
like a morose, emotional rock and roll lament,
the half-dozen songs on the second half
resemble the more "classic" Five-Eght sound:
structured, medium-to-fast-tempo songs with
meandering chord progressions, sudden stops
and starts, concise drum fills, Horowitz's consis
tent thumping of eighth notes on the lower reg
ister of the bass and, of course, Mantione's
crackly yelps.
"Take Whet You Want" and "Alexander
Graham Bell" could easily fit alongside songs on
Weirdo, and "AU My Patients" features an old-
style rave-up circa The
Angriest Man.
Mantione plucks "Oh
Surgery"—another song
with brass, keyboards and
additional banjo—out
with that familiar, synco
pated guitar rhythm on
which he always leans.
This one is certainly one
of Mantione's standouts
of the collection: all
heartbreak, sadness and
anger. And all that mum
bling in the background!
That trick hasn't been so
properly explored since
R.E.M.'s "9-9." Seriously.
It's not dear whether this
one's about a character's
plea for attention or need for a gender reversal
operation... or both.
"Orlando," another jangly-but-moody one
played at a slow gate in half-time, calms things
down a bit. Mantione asks, "Why do we raise the
dead with every argument?"
The Good Nurse condudes the only way it
should—with a bang and a whimper. "A Dose
Approximation"—a creepy, march-like instru
mental punctuated with street noise, ambulance
sirens, and off-kilter guitar werk that would
make television's Richard Lloyd blush—segues
into the clincher, "Florence." Mantione played
this extremely sad, softhearted waltz on an
acoustic guitar live to tape. It's not all doom and
: gloom, however; it takes three verses to trace
- the dosing chapter of the life of "old Florence,"
a silver-haired woman "falling away" through
moments of anger, fear, joy and bravery. "She's
- gone into the hands of our God... I'm so glad to
' have known someone so strong... but not hard."
How Mantione can sing so beautifully of such
things with such quiet reserve without breaking
into tears is more than remarkable.
Ballard Lesemann
WHO Five-fight*
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