REVIEW OF BOB CLEARMOUNTAIN'S MIX OF NO WORLD ORDER

Review by Jeff Gauss (Switch to
)
6/24/2003

i now have several of the "alternative mixes" of No World Order and my current favorite is the one from bob clearmountain. the extra mixes by other producers can be found when playing NWO on a CD-i player. bob has been involoved with many great acts as producer and/or mixer and his discography includes such artists as hall & oates, bryan adams, sir paul mccartney, bruce springsteen, elton john, david bowie, ringo starr, and the rolling stones!

his complete discography is here:

http://www.mixthis.com/discoprint.html

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bob clearmountain's no world order mix
(17:51)

time stood still forms the basic thread for this interpretation as it opens up this piece and reprises at a crucial point later on. verses are in different order and several 'near a cappella' vocal lines appear. a sweet arpeggio section walks up and down a familiar scale leading us into another 'near a cappella' section.

this mellow introduction soon gets whalloped, however, when proactivity comes screaming in as the second tune contrasts sharply. another small instrumental arpeggio scale is similarly worked in before that killer guitar solo---which we are treated to twice, the second time 'round it floats atop a very stripped-down background.

in fact, much of this interpretation is stripped-down. small musical interludes work very well as tie-ins/segues between songs with great results.

word made flesh follows with a chorus beginning the song and parts of verses taken out to really emphasize the driving rhythms below that are angry with miscontent and mad determination. an amazing "word made flesh" that is barely audible on todd's mixes is stretched out near the end as fever broke re-appears.

...only to stop. we are brought to a dead-on and very abrupt hault, temporarily, that oddly enough segues into a fever broke reprise that is, once again, very bare and stripped down to emphasize todd's amazing vocal lines. voice dances from side-to-side only to end in a subtle one man show ending things simply with the line
"fever broke"
...and it is beautiful.

this sweetly takes us into love thing. this is the one that is the most similar to todd's take of this song as the bouncy pop side of this great tune is emphasized above all else.
"some sweet thing"----beautiful!
(love) things become a cappella for a bit again before hitting another small instrumental to segue us into property in which the verses are in way different order. this tune is blessed with another great guitar solo...but we only get half of it as bridge takes us into another verse prompting an outtro chorus of building proportions to bring this interpretation to a close

"you can never own someone."

this is indeed an excellent take on a highly misunderstood todd album from the great bob clearmountain.


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