Chairs Missing- The Music of Wire

Few bands could match them for versatility by the time they made their third album. It's really too much to ask that anyone match them now that they've made 11 studio albums and countless other ephemera. Wire is a rare case, a band that keeps getting better, pushing boundaries, and evolving far into its career. From their debut to their latest album, hardly a track goes by in their discography without a twitch of the head, a nod from the listener- "well now, that's interesting." Don't call them post-punk. Just call 'em bloody well good.

There are a lot of reasons 1977 was an amazing year. The Talking Heads' debut album, Marquee Moon by Television, Ramones and all that. But Wire's Pink Flag has them all beat for prescience. Pink Flag buzzes and drills right past punk into strange territory, becoming an art school Rocket to Russia. 21 tracks, 35 minutes. That's all they need to hook you.

Drill, drill, drilling into your head

The album basically has one guitar tone, that of a scratching, insistent power-drill boring through pop-song forms and the occasional dark epic. The opener, 'Reuters', is named for a news agency that often covered wars. The closing words of the song showcase an ironic band-wide shout of "Looting! Burning! RAPE!", with the 'rape' initially drawn out, and then repeated on certain beats for the duration of the song, forming a near-chant. It even becomes catchy by the end, if you can believe it. The track following, "Field Day For The Sundays", clocks in at 28 seconds, as the narrator expresses his desire to be scandalized, so as to appear in the paper as a tasteless controversy. "I wanna be a target for the dailies so they can show/ pictures of me with a nude on page three/ so lacking in taste/ touched up near the waste, looking as limp as Monday morning". Fun stuff, when you actually can puzzle out the run-together, heavily English idioms.

Each track gets in some memorable licks, welding funky yet often sweetly melodic bass lines and martial drumming to its metallic guitar riffing. Jaunty and bitter proclamations assault the listener, popping up like whack-a-moles, then ducking back, leaving the silence to describe the import of every chant, yell, and pithy lyrical flourish. Some are political, some are willfully obscure, but all dazzle with wit in print, and confound when heard aloud. All this and some genuinely great harmonies to boot. What a record.

Chairs Missing, containing some of Wire's finest mood pieces.

Pink Flag was the start of a promising career as punk-rockists, but Wire weren't content to just sit on their laurels. Their next album was even weirder, darker, and better. For Chairs Missing, they pumped up the eerie soundscapes and keyboard parts, whipped up even more arty-but-not-pretentious lyrics, and dammed up most of the punk stuff, instead favoring haunting, creepy contemplations on insanity, suicide, and all manner of psychological quirk and malformations. The guitars adopt a wider range, the bass rumbles in a frequently evil fashion, and squeedly, bleeping keyboards lend an air of unreality and delusion to masterpieces of madness, from the (literally) killer "Practice Makes Perfect" to the raving, rocking closer "Too Late". Often, the lyrics are themselves as atmospheric as the music, quietly suggesting daft ideas, screwy bouts of violence, and tragicomic singsong from the mouth of the asylum. Pop gems sit uncomfortably and fidget next to screwy black comic farce, and through it all, safe, sensible musical ideas take up their corners and hug themselves into the fetal position, afraid to look into the psychotic abyss. Chairs Missing is, for this fact, one of the most effective Wire albums, perhaps the best, but it does no favors to neophytes with its unerringly arty vision and squirrely keyboards. I do suggest getting to know this one on its own terms, taking it in as a piece and letting its eccentricities slide. (Also, go turn on "I Am The Fly" and see if it syncs up with the Cronenberg remake of The Fly. I'm still wondering if these two can do that Wizard of Oz/ Pink Floyd thing.)



As demonstrated by the above track, 154 moved things in a decidedly different direction. The punks became completely post here; keyboards are integrated more fully, there are dancier and even more atmospheric songs, and the boys crank out more grotesque pop permutations. Graham Lewis, their bassist, gets his first turn on vocals on a number of songs. The tempos slow to a molasses crawl for some more experimental pieces, none of which particularly thrill. That said, most of the material is extremely solid, both presaging the Sonic Youths of later years and the My Bloody Valentines to follow them. Immersive production and smooth electronic elements complement their delicious guitar tones and doomy bass. If it weren't for "A Touching Display" and "The Other Window" to destroy the momentum, this might be the best Wire album. As it is, it's still great.

From here, Wire split for an extended hiatus, and reformed after five years. Since then, their evolution, though not as rapid, has hopped madly from pop, electronic, and dance music to their punk roots between bouts of activity and breaks. One of their most notable periods is their current tenure, starting from 1999. Since their reformation, Wire have looked back fondly on their punk roots even as they approach middle age, something Mission of Burma have done to similar effect. Their current line of albums and EPs, encompassing Read and Burn numbers 1-3 in the EP series and the albums Send and Object 47, show a band still full of restless energy and nowhere near spent for ideas.

Some favorite tracks:

• 'Mannequin', a personal favorite from Pink Flag. The band-wide harmonies during the chorus are just sublime. Fantastic bass runs as well.
  
• 'Too Late', closing out Chairs Missing. Great riffing, but after the first chorus gradually builds in intensity, we get an electronic blot of freakout that lasts for the rest of the track, vocals chiming back in to ask that eternal question, "Is it too late to change my mind? Too late, too late, too too too too too late!"
• 'Map Ref. 41n 93w', one of the finest pop songs they penned, from 154. Heavily layered production, delicious keyboard riffs and guitars chiming and drifting, a little self-referential 'chorus' announcement, wonderful vocal production, it's absolutely gorgeous.
  
• 'Comet', from Read and Burn 01. Insanely fast drumming, especially considering the age of the drummer, Pink Flag-style metallic guitar slashing into your skull. Machine-precise drum breaks, and some whipsawing electronics. Breakneck fast, penetrating riffage.
• 'One of Us', from their latest full-length, Object 47. Silky smooth keyboard textures, bouncy, groovy bass lines, tightly-reined disco drums, and an ace chorus that is completely betrayed by the pop songform- "One of us will live to rue the day we met each other." Very catchy stuff.

As great as their songcraft is, their best albums deserve to be heard in their entirety, all at once. Now that they've been reissued, you can pick up a copy of any of their first three masterpieces from online retailers, record shops, or their own band website. Please support a great band and purchase their music if possible. Thanks for reading.