 by Rob van Alstyne
Mark Oliver Everett, the 42-year-old mastermind behind the musical group eels is a musical chameleon nearly on par with David Bowie in his penchant for restless re-envisioning. When eels (not Eels or The Eels, just eels, as it is strongly noted in their press materials) briefly swam in the mainstream, thanks to their 1996 hit single, “Novacaine for the Soul,” Everett looked like a poster-boy of the then booming Alternative Nation, replete with neon dyed hair and painted fingernails, only to reemerge just a few years later sporting dark hair and a mangy beard, with a decidedly darker and morbid album (1998’s Electro-Shock Blues) about the untimely deaths of his family members. The intervening years have been just as full of surprises with eels consistently scoring critical kudos even as their stateside commercial appeal has shrunk to the point that the band’s new double album, Blinking Lights and Other Revelations, is seeing the light of day on indie imprint Vagrant Records (the same label that launched the start of Paul Westerberg’s “basement” phase three years ago).
Download an mp3 of the eels’ song “Sweet L’il Thing.”
 Everett,
who performs under the nom du rock E, isn’t surprised that his shape-shifting
musical ways frequently have a hard time finding a mass audience (despite his
consistently melodic and darkly witty songwriting). With albums that veer from
exercises in chirpy pop (2000’s Daises of the Galaxy) to fuzzed
out angst (2002’s Souljacker), it’s quite easy to envision
fans of particular albums, but much harder to imagine the pliable fan who would
be enamored of all things eels.
“That’s one of the interesting problems of the eels is that people
will come to our concerts one year based on what they saw the year before and
then end up being hugely disappointed,” admits E via telephone from his
hotel room in Amsterdam shortly before eels are to play the final show of their
European tour (dubbed ‘eels with strings’ and featuring a string
quartet and various organs instead of the usual rock ’n’ roll set-up).
“People came to the 2000 tour and saw us with saxophones and acoustic
guitars and tympani and thought it was pretty and nice and then they came the
next year and we all had giant beards and were playing loud distorted guitars.
A lot of the reaction was, ‘What the fuck is this?’ Personally I
don’t understand why people would want the same thing over and over again.
That being said, I never do something musically just to dazzle people with how
versatile I can be. The next album isn’t going to be a polka record just
because I could—I won’t do that because it’s not in my heart.
I think [the genre hopping in my music] is a product of growing up and listening
to a lot of different music very intensely and getting deeply into it for different
phases of my life.”
 Everett
may not have intended to “dazzle” with his versatility, but he’s
done it anyway on Blinking Lights, a sprawling 33-track epic, at times
excruciating, largely invigorating—and entirely eels. It’s hard
to imagine another artist of this profile willing to make such an ambitious
record. With Everett’s longtime bandmates Kool G Murder (bass) and Butch
(drums) rounded out by an assortment of guest-spotting stars (Tom Waits is on
this platter in addition to songs co-written with the Lovin’ Spoonful’s
John Sebastian and R.E.M.’s Peter Buck) and a bevy of lush instrumentation
(horns, strings and winds abound), Blinking Lights is the first time
Everett’s dared be bold enough to bring all his disparate musical styles
to bare on one record.
On Blinking, Everett makes room at the dinner table for all of his
split musical personalities to dig in. There’s the film scoring auteur
behind the numerous captivating brief instrumental numbers; the dour balladeer
whose straight-from-the-heart delivery forces more than a bit of spine tingle
in the listener from the sheer depth of his genuine ache; and then the droll
rocker behind the album’s manic pop moments. Although Blinking Lights’
anything-goes-musical-template is occasionally jarring and lacks for flow, the
album works anyway through sheer verve and precision of execution. Just when
you think E’s finally peeled off one too many mournful piano ballads (for
me that point was track 7 of disc 2, “If You See Natalie”), he follows
it up with a slice of immaculate chilled-out dance pop (“Sweet Li’l
Thing”).
 This
is the kind of record that’s simply too interesting (read: unmarketable)
for a major label to be releasing in this day and age dominated by a bottom-line-play-it-safe-mentality.
“It’s hard to say but I think that it would have been a pretty tall
order [for a major label to release Blinking Lights as a double album],”
admits E, “and that’s my main concern. I’ve always worked
very independently in the truest way I can. I bankroll the whole record making
process and personally pay for it ahead of time. [Even when I was recording
for now defunct major label Dreamworks] I never once got the call from them
being like, ‘Hey, let’s start working on the next record,’
because I would already have finished and mastered it—and just sent it
over to them. I worked that way because I never wanted to collaborate with a
label in the way they wanted to. It’s sad, but the truth is if you’re
an artist that has some kind of vision and are seeing it through—if you’re
insane enough to be someone like that—what the [major labels] will do
is just try and water it down until it’s not special. As each big company
merges with another one the music keeps becoming more and more secondary, it’s
just about making the shareholders happy. That’s the reason why the major
labels are in the toilet right now—and they brought it on themselves.”
Free from the shackles of corporate rockdom at last, Everett’s wasting
no time in continuing to follow his unfailingly original muse. “I’m
just a dumb songwriter, but one thing I’ve noticed with music going on
today is that it seems to me like a lot of bands lately strike me more as bands
made up of record collectors or bands of fans,” claims E. “It’s
a good starting point, to be a fan and start there, but I think it’s more
important to find something unique about you and find out what you can offer
that no one else can. I remember reading Ray Charles’ autobiography when
I was a teenager and he said, ‘You’ve got to make it stink like
your own manure.’ It’s kind of a graphic way of putting it—but
he had a point. I’ve always tried to stay true to that.”
eels with strings perform on Tue. June 21 at the Pantages Theatre. 7:30
p.m. All Ages. $25.50. 710 Hennepin Ave., Mpls. 612-339-7007.
Find out more about eels on their official website at
eelstheband.com.
Head on over to our mp3 page to download hundreds of tunes, including the eels’ song “Sweet L’il Thing.”
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