Down in the City of Heartbreak and Needles Volume 2

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Edward Ka-Spel's solo musings are usually worth a listen, and this second volume of rarities should be a painless experience even if the psychedelic excesses of the Legendary Pink Dots aren't necessarily to your liking. If it's not already familiar (and beloved) to you from encounters with the Dots or The Tear Garden, Ka-Spel's vocalizations might initially register as a spidery, quirkily inflected monotone. Give it a little time, and his earnestness inevitably wears down your reserve, the head Dot's breathy singsong lilt (and the distinct "w" shape of his slurred "r"s) gradually becoming as customary and comfortable as a favorite pair of slippers. Volume 2 begins where the earlier collection left off, unearthing the appealing "Even Now" from Ka-Spel's very first record (1984's Dance China Doll EP) and the remainder of the same year's Laugh China Doll LP, but the CD goes on to include more recent and unreleased material. Three songs from the 1984 LP are bittersweet nothings casually intoned over the dated patter of a drum machine, not dissimilar to the poppier pieces sprinkled among the Dots' first three albums. "Lady Sunshine" is a little different, a '60s-styled angel-dusted jewel, simple piano chords, winsomely romantic lyrics, tasteful church-bells, all ensconced within folds of irridescent synth. Jump forward a few years to Robot Records' "Inferno"/ "Illusion" 10" and the a-side of "The Man Who Never Was" 7" - all intervening Ka-Spel solo material having already been made available on CD. In keeping with the concurrent Dots albums, both of the 10" tracks show a leap into abstraction. The sound-sculpture doesn't come at the expense of song on "Inferno" and "Man...," but all three pieces soon plunge into the shifting harmonious drone explorations and involved tape-work embroidery associated with H.N.A.S. (Christoph Heemann is credited with "sonic manipulation") and the LPD/H.N.A.S. collective, Mimir. The next leap forward comes with the three new pieces. "A Crack In Melancholy Time" gives a track from the Dots' 1994 album, 9 Lives to Wonder, a chilling once-over, Ka-Spel mewling for release from within a bank of yowling, roiling noise and electronic disturbance. More radio and electronic disinformation filters through "Number Nine Number Nine Number Nine Number Nine." Will these avant-garde types ever tire of the implications and "significance" of John Lennon's looped piss-takes? Speaking of loops, "The Fool With Spanners" teeters between the oddly tranquilizing effect of its cantankerous grind and gusts of full-blown sonic insanity, the occasional memorable Ka-Spelism ("nail me to my shadow!") audible above the turmoil. Survive that, and the relative composure of his latest opus, the convoluted, ambitious The Blue Room, will be a stroll in the park.