When trying to sell your new album, it’s vitally important NOT to have a cover which looks like it was assembled by a committee of kindergarten-age head trauma patients:
Never mind the shoddy presentation of this album, kids–this geezer is singing his love ballads in a NEW ACCENT! Hold on to your zippers, it’s gonna be a long night!
In the 60s, lots of so-called manly album covers wound up looking more like unintentionally homo-erotic ones. Here’s a great example, crammed full of “we didn’t mean that” double-entendre song titles.
In hindsight, how ELSE can you interpret a song like Whistle Punk Pete or There Walks a Man? If “whistle punk” isn’t some kind of euphemism for a rent boy, what is? Somebody get George Takei on the phone and ask him what HE thinks a whistle punk is good for.
It must be understood that unlike Rick Santorum, we have no qualms with homo-eroticism. No, the comedy value here is the exact opposite–people trying SO VERY HARD (ahem) to present a “manly” image that they wind up flying in the complete opposite direction. When you’ve got tunes on your record like Sick of Settin’ Chokers and Fire Danger, what else are we supposed to think?
Then again, maybe that’s the point–are loggers privvy to a secret side of their industry the rest of us don’t know? Maybe it’s a sexual free-for-all in those woods and the rest of us are missing out. A record like this definitely gives the game away…maybe you’d like to hitch a ride on the log truck? Now everybody SING: “I’m a lumberjack and I’m O.K……..”
Seriously?
Oh, the prison tats on the little kid…I’m sure SOMEBODY thought that was CUTE. How cute is it? Well, let’s see what that bastion of accuracy Wikipedia has to say:
“The teardrop tattoo or tear tattoo is a symbolic tattoo that is placed underneath the eye. It has no fixed meaning but almost all meanings have some connection to prison. In the United States, it can mean the wearer has killed someone and the number of teardrops may indicate the number of killings. It can also indicate the number of years served in prison or the loss of a loved one or fellow gang member.
In at least one prison, (Oaxaca State) it indicates that the wearer was raped in prison.”
Ohhhhhh dear.
The WTF factor on this album art by Mew is so high that you might get a nosebleed while contemplating its awfulness. Fortunately for this band, the music itself does not choke the way the cover does.
And The Glass Handed Kits features music that sounds a bit like a more pop-oriented (and less uber-trippy) Gang Gang Dance. There’s an epic quality to many of the tracks on this record that are totally misrepresented by this violently awful cover. Though it has to be said, they manage to veer excruciatingly off into Neil Young “Harvest” territory at times…and do we really need anybody besides Neil Young warbling away like that? Er, not realllllly.
Ignore the cover and try to head toward the experimental pop portions of this Mew record. You can preview bits of all tracks at the Mew And The Glass Handed Kites Amazon page.