1月7日 Sunday 星期日

HAZE SOUNDS 荣誉呈现 Proudly Presents

THE CHAMELEONS

嘉宾 Guest：鸟撞 BIRDSTRIKING

1981年，氛围流行乐队The Chameleons（变色龙）成立于英国曼切斯特，成员来自于当地几只老牌乐队：主唱兼贝斯手Mark Burgess来自于Cliches，吉他手Reg Smithies以及Dave Fielding来自于Years；而鼓手John Lever来自于Politians。在BBC进行了一系列出彩的亮相后，the Chameleons收到了当地厂牌Epic的一纸合约，并迅速发行了处子EP《Nostalgia》。该张EP由 Steve Lillywhite制作，以单曲《In Shreds》 为代表，紧张和情绪化是EP的基调。

乐队在上世纪80年代发行了3张录音室专辑，包括在Static旗下1983年发行的第一张专辑《Script of the Bridge》，1985年的二专《What Does Anything Mean? Basically》，以及1986年更换到Geffen旗下发行的第三张专辑《Strange Times》。Burgess作为主脑，创作了其中绝大部分作品，几乎一年一张且张张经典的发行速度见证了Burgess旺盛且出色的创作力。在这段The Chameleons的黄金时期，作为80年代英国乐坛新浪潮的代表人物，他们是与The Cure、Gang Of Four这些日后的巨星级乐队相提并论，并被看作将后朋发扬光大的中坚力量。然而一切在1987年戛然而止，随着乐队主理人Tony Fletcher的突然死亡，过度悲伤的几位成员宣告解散乐队。在1990年乐队推出了一张名为《Tony Fletcher Walked on Water, La La La La La-La La-La-La》的EP，用来纪念这位缔造乐队辉煌的经理人。

解散之后，乐队成员分别组建过一些其他乐队，也发行过一些个人作品，其中以主唱Burgess最为成功。2000年The Chameleons宣布重组并进行了全英的“五月巡演”，除了现场演出之外，乐队发行了以老歌为主但重新编配的专辑《Strip》。2001年乐队发行了一张不插电专辑《This Never Ending Now》以及最后一张录音室专辑《Why Call It Anything》，并在欧洲和美国进行了大规模的重组巡演。2003年The Chameleons虽未官方宣布解散，却再次消失在人们的视野里。

从2009年至今，主唱Mark Burgess与鼓手 John Lever再次走到一起，组建Chameleons Vox，在表演时依然以The Chameleons的作品为主，并发行了全新EP《M+D=1(8)》。2017年3月，鼓手Lever不幸离世。Mark Burgess与其他几位乐手一起继续着The Chameleons的传奇。

Somewhere in a parallel universe ,The Chameleons would have been one of the biggest bands in the world. As it stands, I can probably count the people I know who have even heard of them on one hand and still have some fingers left.

Though their first record, Script Of the Bridge stacks up favorably as a debut album against, say Boy by U2 (the band they are most often compared to), and in their live shows — usually in small clubs or theaters — they create a noise big enough to fill a stadium, the Chameleons just never really caught on in America. Of all the bands I've ever heard, I would, in fact, have to rate the Chameleons as the single greatest band practically no one has ever heard of.

My discovery of this great eighties band came by way of a record review I read in Rolling Stone. Having worked in a record store at the time, I rarely paid attention to such reviews, mainly because my job gave me access to pretty much anything I ever wanted to hear. But also, because the critics so rarely ever got anything right.

This review, however, caught my eye. It compared The Chameleons to other English bands of the moment I really liked — such as Echo And The Bunnymen and the aforementioned U2. But the writer also used exactly the right buzz words to pique my interest. Words like "dark and desolate," and "layered and textured."

In this particular case, the reviewer nailed it.

Script Of The Bridge is simply an amazing debut album. Script is the sort of record that sounds as though it was recorded by a band that had been making records for years. Released first as a British import in 1983, MCA Records would notoriously screw up the American release later that same year by changing the song sequencing and omitting some tracks altogether.

Since the most popular eighties rock bands of the time were split pretty much three ways — you had your syntho-pop "Flock of Haircuts" type bands; your Clash City proto-punkers; and then you had your standard bearing English guitar bands like U2 — The Chameleons probably best fit into the "guitar" group. That is, if you choose to put a label on them at all.

As stated in that original review, Script is a densely layered work awash in dark sounding minor guitar chords that probably do compare somewhat to U2's The Edge or Echo's Will Sargent. They use the same sort of raga-esque sonic cadence that can be traced clear back to sixties psychedelic bands like Jefferson Airplane. But the comparisons end there.

For my money, what The Chameleons do better than anybody ever has is use a sort of counterpoint in their music. It combines the sort of sense of darkness and foreboding suggested by the often doomy sounding lyrics of their creative mastermind, bassist-vocalist Mark Burgess, with deeper musical layers that often float to the surface in lighter shades.

In the song "Monkeyland" from Script — a song Mark Burgess is said to have written about the music business — the lyrics are sung as an almost agonizing plea for help:

"I shake my head and shiver,
They smile and stab my back as they shake my hand,
Send out an SOS Please.
I'm marooned in Monkeyland."

Amidst a musical backdrop of dark sounding guitars ticking away like a timebomb, there is a marked tension to this music. From there the band explodes into a multiple layered wash of guitars as Burgess wails about it being "just a trick of the light" and the need to know "what is real and what is illusion."

晚9点 // 200元（现场）/ 150元（预售 | 数量有限，售完即止）

Pm 9 // Rmb 200 (door) / 150 (presale | on a first-come-first-serve-basis)

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