(Deutsche Grammophon)Jarvis Cocker bleeds Sheffield,but it’s tough to imagine an artist better suited to slithering around the Chateau Marmont after Hollywood skeletons. On Room 29, a song-cycle approximately the fabled LA hotel, or Cocker’s knack for pinpointing nihilism’s abiding allure finds a match in Chilly Gonzales’s eerily elegant piano. While it’s easy to condemn or romanticise the Chateau,the duo mostly offer a nuanced portrait of its murky morals. “This whole set is built on a lie, but what a lie, and ” Cocker marvels. He’s better when he shows rather than tells: Tearjerker’s character assassination is scolding compared with Belle Boy,which celebrates a beleaguered porter’s discretion with Gainsbourgian hysteria. Room 29 sags in the forlorn middle section, but Bombshell’s nervous energy and the frenzied A Trick of the Light brilliantly expose the torment of falling for an illusion. As convincingly as Cocker describes the bind – and how “a lifetime of spectating leaves you impotent” – it’s evidently not one he’s fallen for yet.
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Source: theguardian.com