The Gothic Archies: The New Despair

More Stephin Merritt. On the official Gothic Archies web page he declares, "What makes this band different from The Magnetic Fields is that any glimmer of hope is absolutely extinguished."

Well, kind of. The titles — It's Useless To Struggle, City Of The Damned, The Abandoned Castle Of My Soul — and the lyrics live up to the 'no hope' schtick, but it's pretty clear that Stephin is enjoying just fooling around with himself and his mock morbidity. The music on City and Abandoned Castle is positively jaunty.

The feeling you get with Stephin Merritt's despair is that, yes, he probably does believe that we are — or, specifically, he is — doomed to unhappiness, and things aren't going to get any better. But he accepts that with a shrug, as though he knows that life is pointless, but it's pointless that it's pointless, so it doesn't really matter.

I realised that, though I like this more than Wasps' Nests, I've played it less. I don't know why that is.

MusicBrainz entry for this album