Patti Smith and Kevin Shields The Coral Sea by: Ed Butler Sun:31-Aug-08 Label: Pask Year: 2008 WB rating 30 out of 100

In reviewing The Coral Sea, I simply cannot avoid talking about how this record affected me. And here’s the thing: as much as I love these two artists, I don’t like poetry.

Because, make no mistake, dear reader, this is not a music album. It is poetry, awash in a hazy ocean of Kevin Shields' distorted guitar excursions. Like the radioactivity that represents all we know of the big bang, the sounds he creates here are 13 billion years removed from the stunning soundscapes he cultivated with My Bloody Valentine; a faded echo, thin and formless. But, halfway through the recording, it quickly becomes apparent that that is precisely the point.

The Coral Sea is Smith's ode to her dead friend, artist Robert Mapplethorpe, dead from AIDS some time ago. The performances, recorded a year apart, are distinctly different while telling the same story; Mapplethorpe's life as that of a sailor, doomed to be defeated by the ocean he calls home. And the story itself is interesting enough. The problem is the medium.

Spoken-word performances set to experimental music are, almost by definition, destined to descend into unbearable pretentiousness, and this, unfortunately, is no exception. There are moments, particularly on the second disc, which features the second performance, where Smith lapses into song, and Shields' effects gain volume and musicality, and the lyrics begin to leap out of the speakers, gaining life and colour. But, too often, The Coral Sea delves too far into hyper-drama and cryptic phraseology.

I can imagine the actual performances. Audiences staring, wide-eyed, with rapt attention, enthralled by every over-emoted word. It is easy to envision this when confronted by the nearly two-minute ovation the first performance receives. But, frankly, while it seems I am set apart from the vast majority who listened to this and saw fit not to criticise two musical deities, I like my music musical.