Nude

The third album from the one-man band known as VAST is out and I’ve given it a few listens through. My overall impression is that in depth and richness it sounds more like the first album, but it’s constructed along the same lines as the second in terms of keeping the pacing snappy and the song lengths down under four minutes apiece. (There are two notable exceptions to that rule, one good and one not-so-good.)

Visual Audio Sensory Theater, the self-titled-ish first album, was a dense and dark experimental work that was just as likely to explore religious as romantic themes. It is among my favorite records of all time, which is why I so eagerly awaited the arrival of Nude and before it Music For People, which I found to be generally enjoyable but with too much of a “must sell to radio” construction about it. My biggest beef with People is the uniformity of song length coupled with the reduction of subject matter down to being just a collection of love (new and lost) songs. It’s not a bad album, really, but it’s not exactly what I think of as a worthy follow-up to the original work.

Nude is better. The subject matter is still love, new and lost and obsessive alike. One can hear more interesting things going on under the surface this time around, though. It feels as though Jon Crosby is trying to do the interesting things he did on his first album while still keeping to the industry-friendly song lengths and rock-n-roll elements that keep his bread buttered.

Let’s cut to the, er, cuts. The two lead-off tracks are “Turquoise” and “Thrown Away,” respectively. They’re good, solid toe-tappers. Then we get to “Don’t Take Your Love Away,” which… isn’t. One of the two tracks to run over four minutes, it’s also the only track that leaves me completely underwhelmed. Ah well. “Be With Me” picks the pace up again, while “Lost” manages to be somber without sucking the enjoyment out of the listening experience.

“Winter In My Heart” is one of the standout tracks here. There’s a quality of elegant pain to it that captivates me. It also counts as the obligatory parental-advisory moment, since Jon seems compelled to work an F-bomb just once into every album. Don’t ask me why.

“I Need To Say Goodbye,” “Japanese Fantasy,” “Ecstacy” and “Candle” are generally good pieces, though only “Fantasy” stands out as particularly interesting among this set.

The other over-four-minutes piece is “I Can’t Say No (To You),” and it makes up for all of the failures of its counterpart early in the album. I think this song shows best the promise of what we can expect to hear on future albums… at least, I certainly hope to hear more pieces at this level. It’s dark, obsessive, gentle and beautiful all at once.

Nude closes out much as Music for People did, with a typically quiet piece centered on an acoustic guitar and uncluttered arrangement, in this case a little gem called “Desert Garden.” While not as hauntingly beautiful as “Lady of Dreams” from People, it’s still a charming little love song that I suspect will grow on me with time.

While I nitpick and kibbutz here about specific tracks, only “Don’t Take Your Love Away” actually disappoints. Nude is a worthwhile listen, though perhaps not a true classic in the making. I’ve taken to looking at VAST as a work in progress… and this album shows progress and promise.

Comments

5 responses to “Nude”

  1. heather Avatar
    heather

    *nodding head vigourously* I couldn’t have said it better myself.

    There seem to be two other album versions of Nude under the names of Crimson and Turquiose that each have one or two songs not on the Nude cd or the counterpart for that matter. Maybe that is where the dark, hauntic, obsessive, romatic almost gothic ballads lie.

    I won’t subject myself or my wallet to buying 2 more copies of practically the same album save a few songs. Instead, I will just religiously play the new album and hope it turns into one of my favs. 🙂

  2. christian Harmony Avatar
    christian Harmony

    Turquoise and Crimson are downloas, $2.99 each and well worth it, 8 songs that didn’t make the album, and a few of my fave VAST songs, Beautiful, Where It Never Rains, Thats My Boy and I Woke Up LA. Well worth the $6.00

  3. jamie Avatar

    yeah fully man. turquoise and crimson are unmixed demos, there’s some awesome stuff on them. where it never rains was one of my favourites, its a shame it didnt get onto the new album

  4. GreyDuck Avatar

    I went ahead and grabbed the two downloadables, and agree there’s some nice stuff in there… especially “Never Rains,” “Beautifull” (sic) and “I Woke Up L.A.”

    Welcome to those of you coming here from the EZBoard thread! (Referrer logs. Gotta love ’em.) I’m sorry I didn’t find “Don’t Take” as appealing as some of you have, but that’s okay… we’re all allowed to like and dislike as we please, and more importantly we can all agree that more Vast is a good thing. =)

  5. jamie Avatar

    quote: Welcome to those of you coming here from the EZBoard thread!

    heh, like me. thanks. glad to see you downloaded the two online supplements as well. i wonder if we’re to see them reviewed also?