B.C. Camplight Blink of a Nihilist by: Tom Perry Tue:25-Sep-07 Label: One Little Indian Year: 2007 WB rating 76 out of 100

Insert Brian Wilson comparison here. Sorry, but it needs to be said. Because frankly, all B.C. Camplight needs is a serious weight/narcotics problem, and he’ll be channelling the big hairy Beach Boy. On Blink Of A Nihilist, B.C. Camplight’s second full length, we see all of Wilson’s trademarks: multi-layered muti-gender vocals, massive sweeping orchestral arrangements – and some questionably positive old-school pop tunes.

Going under the name of B.C. Camplight, Brian Christinzio’s complex sounds evoke comparisons with not only The Beach Boys’ legendary leader but some other indie notaries including Ben Folds, Sufjan Stevens, The Shins, Belle & Sebastian – or even Hal David and Burt Bacharch.  But to label B.C. Camplight as purely imitation does feel like a bit of a disservice, because the work we’ve got here is complex and impressive – put together by a man who could easily be painted with the ‘musical genius’ label in his own right.

Despite this, and the one-man band moniker, Christinzio is obviously a team player. There are a variety of names on each of Nihilist’s tracks – creating a complex, multi-layered sound for the album. The opening three songs, ‘Suffer For Two’, ‘Lord, I’ve Been On Fire’ and ‘Werewolf Waltz’, in particular, are delicately arranged pieces with strong string, brass and percussion sections. Of these second tune ‘Lord, I’ve Been On Fire’ is the album’s most infectious piece, and is a perfect companion to Sufjan Stevens’ commercial hit, ‘Chicago’. It’s one of those tunes that despite – or possibly, because of – its repetitive nature, stays with you for days.

And like many of the songs on this album it features some curiosities that you suspect have some form of purpose or meaning. In ‘Lord, I’ve Been on Fire’ we have an oddly-placed bridge, full of curious, occasionally audible, chatter about all manner of things: “And they hit it with a laser!?…”, “Hello Mr Edison, welcome home, I trust that your trip to Europe was enjoyable?…”, “Let’s me see your fake teeth…”.

The remainder of the album is no less eccentric, but manages to diversity in its left-field approaches. Fifth and sixth tracks ‘Soy Tonto’ and ‘The Hip and the Homeless’ are B.C. Camplight doing his best takes on Hal David and Burt Bacharach in full lounge/groove mode. Both are great fun, loads of xylophone, strings, and a plethora of horns moving in-and-out of the tune. ‘Office Down’ is, however, the darkest of dark. It’s a big, concert hall-filling sound. As background music this would sound relatively harmless; like a 50s-style cabaret duet with a man and woman looking lovingly into each other’s eyes – even complete with cute “Shoobeedowup”s. Yet read (or listen) a little deeper, and this is scary, sinister stuff:

“I could come home to bed/if you both weren’t dead/and in the ground”.
“…I’m awake now/that sucker had little girls/on their knees in alleys with no lights on”
“…Watch the road/Baby watch the road”.

‘Grey Young Amelia’ and ‘I’ve Got a Bad Cold’ continue this dark turn, but with a little less obvious polish. Both are unsettling; ‘I’ve Got a Bad Cold’ in particular, with its slowed-down barbershop harmonies mixed over the sounds of a freeway, verges on Horror movie histrionics. Fortunately, closer ‘Scare Me Sweetly’ brings us back to a relative normality. It’s fun, quick and purely innocent pop-fashioned stuff that that gives more-and- more after multiple listens.

On the surface, B.C. Camplight and his massive team have put together a beautiful, beautiful record. Blink of a Nihilist is full of deep, thoughtful pop music and it is stunningly produced. But it’s also very much the musical equivalent of a clown: yes, it is entertaining, but don’t spend too long looking at it closely, because it’s actually scary as all hell.