Reviews - Go Forth [by Les Savy Fav, CD, 2001]

<I>Go Forth</I> is the third full-length album from Brooklyn's new-wave bruisers Les Savy Fav. One of the most remarkable acts to ever emerge from America's postpunk melting pot (a gang of sharp-dr... more

<I>Go Forth</I> is the third full-length album from Brooklyn's new-wave bruisers Les Savy Fav. One of the most remarkable acts to ever emerge from America's postpunk melting pot (a gang of sharp-dressed art students and a frenzied, hairy front man who dresses as a pirate), Les Savy Fav bring the art of confrontation back to rock & roll, but barb their brash physical assault with a musical ingenuity and fierce intelligence. While the <I>Rome (Written Upside Down)</I> EP was the first record to properly capture the Les Savy live sound--a lithe, danceable new-wave rush peppered with electronics--<I>Go Forth</I> adds beats and synthesizer to the tight, jarring musical clatter. Front man Tim Harrington's continues to write enlightening and elliptical lyrics, a frantic mix of cryptic intellectual allusions and cut-and-paste wordplay ("I crave to catch an edge / Break bones and cartilage / Send back the architects of Carthage," he hollers on "One to Three"). With so much of the alternative sector lost to irony, decadence, and self-absorption, <I>Go Forth</I> sounds as pure and true as a missionary's teachings. Become a convert. <I>--Louis Pattison</I> less