Before their stunted growth in the mid-2000s, Clinic was one of those bands that actually mastered their strange assortment of influences, rather than being ruled by them. They established a sound that was effortlessly irreverent, a kind of controlled schizophrenia spelled out by distorted clarinet, pulsating organ and, save for a few exceptions, trim drum patterns. Instead of assuming the presumptuous mantle of mixed media party host, the band traversed fog-addled forests of the subconscious to carve out a niche - regardless of the historical or contextual fallout.
Walking With Thee highlights the band's ability to create darkness as viewed through a lens of cryptic abstraction. The album comes off much like those 3D holographic cards that you tilt to see the image change, the only difference is that in place of the rainbow refraction is a monochromatic white to gray to black, all stabbed through by windows of pale teal translucence. Where as their debut album, Internal Wrangler, was a swatch - turning from glib folk tale, to bittersweet eulogy, to cheeky social commentary - Walking With Thee presents a distinctly bizarre winter.
Aside from the opening track, "Harmony", the album is chalked full of revolving-door lyrics that make pinning down a respectable interpretation difficult. On "Harmony", singer Ade Blackburn proclaims in his high-register croon, "I believe in Christmas eve/I believe to trust one's free/I believe in happiness/no one living with regrets/come fill yourself with dreams", which is a clear, albeit, resigned call for the goodness in all people. While the lyrics in the song are uncharacteristic of the rest of the album, "Harmony" comes off as a sort of shining gate, standing before the specter-flown landscapes of the rest of the album. It's not that the song is stylistically different - the clarinet, punctuating keyboard and simple house drum rhythm are right in line with the rest of Walking With Thee - but it's optimistic lyrics push it into a reverse-Pixies scenario, where the words are kind and the music is ominous.
The album's most successful hit, "Walking With Thee", is an organ-grinder with clashing drums and Blackburn's paranoid librarian delivery. "As you climb up the stairs and come back forever/Summer's in the house, untamed it was" warbles the singer, following it up with a repetition of "walking with thee" in the chorus. Fuck knows what Blackburn is referring to, but the imagery in the lyrics and the rough delivery of the music provides a creeping, jerky stop-motion animation for the mind, something involving inanimate objects coming to life. Which is convenient, because the music video for the song chooses exactly such a visual representation. When the singer cries out repeatedly, "no, no, no, no", any semblance of knowing what the song might actually be about goes completely out the window.
The nocturnal sway of songs like "Mr. Moonlight" "The Vulture" and "For the Wars" prompt you to travel to otherworldly beat cafes - far, far away from Earth. Everyone snapping their fingers and rolling their shoulders in hypnotized unison, not knowing if they are waiting for an ending or a beginning. Murals of spattered blocks, undefined triangles, cubed self-portraits, still-life lamps and fruit turned into precocious beasts and random phrases litter the sparse walls. It's a place in your mind you can't quite find, but also a place that is undeniably there.
Walking With Thee also pulls upon the sparse, acid guitar lines of spaghetti western soundtracks, mashing them into the ramshackle repetition of krautrock. "Welcome", "The Bridge" and "Sunlight Bathes Our Home" all feature jittering drum lines that have distorted, lightly reverbed guitar ribbons strewn across the top. Add in the permeating ghost of the clarinet, and the idiosyncratic haunt comes on quite strong. The songs act as a textured counterpoint to the pensive night meditation of the album's other half.
After writing all of this about the album, I've come to realize that there is a disjointedness to Walking With Thee that is definitely noticeable, but altogether unimportant in the record's enjoyment. It's because there is a roundabout cohesion, like a collage of unrelated pictures and trinkets that just -works- when you see it. Even "Pet Eunuch", which stands alone as a blast of needling punk rock, somehow fits amidst the minimal genre film soundtracks and dark jazz fusion. Walking With Thee is much like a stream-of-consciousness writing exercise, basking in the unassociated associations that arise out of letting the mind loose. With Clinic, their minds found a playground in music, and though the album comes off quite serious, there is always a lingering grin behind each furrowed brow.
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