by: Mike Lambert

She looked like a librarian. Something among the dusty shelves of ordered certitudes long divorced from reality, dessiccating peacefully, as if a breath of air which sees injustice done.

William Faulkner

Natalie Merchant is no modern "off the peg" rock 'n' roller. She's small, delicate and comes wrapped in a style in vogue some years ago. And she's attractive but not pretty pretty. On stage, fronting 10,000 Maniacs she swirls and skips about and can mesmerise an audience.

The band behind her pummell away on every kind of riff. Mostly ones ripped out of reggae or blues. They do it very well. A hard-working drummer and bassists are the outfits backbone. Dennis Drews' keyboard and J.C. Lombardo's guitar are more or less used as rhythm machines. Robert Buck's white guitar picks out busy single note runs that are a counterpoint to the usual infectious melody that Natalie provides.

They've gigged almost every other day across the States for the past two years - and it shows in their tightness and conviction. The songs range from hard feedback and bottleneck numbers to lighter, almost folky ballads. So far they haven't been written off as 'old hippies'. The power of the music and the intelligent sublety of the lyrics stave off such generalisations. No one has made statements in quite the same way before.

I saw 10,000 Maniacs on their brief visit here and on one of the nights Natalie cried during Tension - a song exorcising her guilt about neglecting her ageing grandparents:

Local posts will list your friends
in order of disappearance
Lawn scattered tins feed birds
the portion baked
for absent guests

That lyrical style is common in their work. The band comes from Jamestown - a quaint, hicksville place on the furthermost fringe of New York State. Something of the ancient order there has got into their blood.

J.C. and Natalie have accumulated a collection of magazines from the twenties. Their appeal lies not just in their yellowed age but in the care which went into the styling. Natalie's notebooks are decorated with old pictures and on stage she'll hold a Victorian photograph, a wistful portrait, close to her chest. The lyric sheet with Secrets of the I Ching is backed with Gustav Dores' etching "The Great Flood".

Much of their conversation centred around a plea for "a more human approach", for "things to be done with some sensitivity". They talked of the decay in parts of America. In London they marvelled at the rebuilding and patching up of places like (ironically) Brixton. Back home it'd be left to rot. They talked of war. Several songs are strongly pacifist - adaptions of Wilfred Owen. Here again they rail against the inhumanity of it all. Against the romanticising, the glory.

Like My Mother the War.....

Haunts a doorway
begs her postman
is there word for
my mother the war

10,000 Maniacs are good people. The kind you saw on "The Little House on the Prairie". Their honesty and openess is probably what shines through their music. An absolute lack of pose that distinguishes it from the slick pop or FM rock. Their naivety might embarass some but there are always plenty of people who want to hear heartfelt observations. Consequently, the songs of the Maniacs will rank alongside those of Janis Ian or Morrissey/Marr. They'll be big in bedsit land. A little more substance than Sade though.....

Greta's cedar hope chest
is full of pamphlets
Glass shelves of romantic vignettes
a journal laced with sedimentary prose

As to achieving world-wide fame and fortune? Shortly they'll sign to a major label. After the grooming their MTV inspired video will almost certainly make them look like the Pretenders 1984.

Besides the 12", My Mother the War, the two albums Human Conflict Number Five and Secrets of the I Ching are pretty easy to get hold of and you should check them out. They were recorded for next to nothing - made and even sold initially by the band. With a name producer, more studio tricks and time there's no telling how the sound might alter. I fear that some of the fragility and the feeling from an "instant" recording might be lost. And the Maniacs are not fans of Hi-Tech.

At least they'll never have to compromise themselves in order to earn a crust. The music is "radio-playable" and the words innoffensive.