by Ted Mills
The most rewarding, the most difficult, and the most accomplished of all the Residents' albums, this was their departure into the field of imaginary ethno-musicography that they had begun on &Six Things to a Cycle& on Fingerprince. Ostensibly a musical ary on the Eskimo, this is an album of icy atmospheres, poetic electronics, and imaginary landscapes, concocted around a loose narrative told in the liner notes. There's also a subtheme of indigenous populations overrun by western commercialism (is that native chant actually &Coca Cola is Life&?). Ex-Henry Cow member Chris Cutler plays a lot of the percussion on the album, especially on the finale, &Festival of Death,& the only real piece of rhythmic music here, which shines out as anything but dark or sinister. In any other group's hands this would have been a pretentious disaster, but the Residents pull it off through spirit, humor, and sheer bravado.