Paul K. & The Weathermen - Apple in my eye

Album : Love is a gas. Alias Records 1997.
Review by Todd Martens
Paul K. doesn't write songs from the perspective of someone who has loved and lost. His Velvet Underground-inspired rock captures the vantage point of someone who has loved, lost, and is desperately trying to talk himself into loving again. Written and recorded in 1996, at a time when many journalists had already heralded K. as one of America's greatest unknowns, Love Is a Gas was, admittedly, K.'s stab at trying to make it into the mainstream. Having already been at it for more than 15 years, K.'s earlier, punk-blues sound had inspired the Afghan Whigs' Greg Dulli to cover K.'s "Amphetamines and Coffee," off K.'s The Blue Sun. The song was perfect for both singers at that time, capturing K.'s bluesy, roadhouse attitude, a more sentimental Lou Reed, perhaps, and Dulli's seductive city swagger. Dulli and K. are now practically brothers gone down opposite roads. That's not to say their paths don't cross, as K.'s cover of Stevie Wonder's "Jesus' Children of America" is propelled by a Whigs-like groove over a soulful backdrop. Dulli, though, uses his battered heart to pimp himself so well that he is able to make masochism and misogyny seem like the sexiest traits known to man, while the music of the Detroit-born and Kentucky-based K. embodies a character Hubert Selby could have written. It's a character who would strut into Sunday church 20 minutes late and sing "Alleluia" with one hand on the bible and the other holding a bottle of whiskey. This drunken quest for redemption permeates Love Is a Gas. It's there right from the start, hidden behind the background "oohs" and "ahhs" on the opening, swinging blast of "Apple in My Eye," and it's there again on the downtrodden, three a.m. rhythm of "Another Night on This Earth." It's here where K.'s bourbon-stained voice is at its most desperate, but it's not the voice of someone who's giving in, as he admits, "another lust knows what it's worth," through pounding, hangover-worthy drumming. As K.'s most pop-oriented album, and one of his most ambitious, recklessness has mostly been replaced with restraint, as his always-competent guitar work simmers with clarity, usually on the verge of breaking loose. It even flirts with feedback on the Motown-influenced "David Ruffin's Tears," which was dedicated to the former Temptation who died in 1991. K. alternates starkness -- "Everything That Glitters" -- with earnestness -- the slyly sweet "Liar's Prayer," loaded with sentiments that betray its title. It's what one is supposed to say at the end of a relationship, not necessarily what one means. This all comes to a crashing halt on "Manna," a nearly five-minute guitar explosion that shows K. can hang with the best of the Yardbirds, offering a powerfully defiant justification for continually gambling on love, a theme that's reinforced with the Las Vegas shots that fill the liner notes. 

Produced by the Velvet's Mo Tucker, who serves as K.'s drummer on this release, and dedicated to her former bandmate Sterling Morission, who passed away in 1995, Love Is a Gas -- a title that works both ironically and honestly -- serves as one of K.'s most concise statements. Like his heroes -- Reed, Townes Van Zandt, and Iggy Pop -- and the best of Nick Cave, a kindred spirit, K. is never self-indulgent when speaking from his broken heart. He's not interested in depressing listeners, or himself, just understanding why he keeps setting himself up for pain, and whether or not there's some salvation at the end of the journey. Love Is a Gas is fueled by the hope that there is.

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