The Holy Ghost Revival
Bleeding Light (1965)
“A thirteen-year-old boy … enjoys the liberties hard won by the alliance of philosophic genius and political heroism, consecrated by the blood of martyrs; he is provided with comfort and leisure by the most productive economy … science has penetrated the secrets of nature in order to provide him with the marvelous, lifelike electronic sound and image reproduction he is enjoying. And in what does progress culminate? A pubescent child whose body throbs with orgasmic rhythms; whose feelings are made articulate in hymns to the joys of onanism or the killing of parents; whose ambition is to win fame and wealth in imitating the drag-queen who makes the music. In short, life is made into a non-stop, commercially pre-packaged masturbational fantasy.”
This quotation, from Allan Bloom’s controversial and conservative The Closing of the American Mind, is quoted on the myspace of Holy Ghost Revival. Even more than the horrible cod-religious clip-art, this passage is a masterpiece of self-critique: like the child, HGR really are a bunch of useless wankers who are wrestling with Freudian fantasies. Throughout Bleeding Light, the true horrors of a progressive rock revival are exposed.
Mining the past has been a fruitful strategy- and only futurist fruitcakes genuinely believe that art can be utterly original, anyway. But HGR copy the mistakes- the mannered vocals that can only be realised by trained opera singers, the lyrics dripping with obscure allusions and empty of meaning. Guitars copy Brian May’s signature bellow, drums run around every roll and fill, desperately searching for a good beat. Ideas- Gnosticism, cabaret, decadence, drama- are not so much referenced as name-dropped. Mr Fox’s sub-title- ‘a Gnostic hymn’ indeed- reveals both the extent of the band’s ambition and reckless rejection of sly pop charm.
The Holy Ghost Revival might find Bloom’s hysteria amusing- it is the most ridiculous critical assessment of modern music since Sinatra said that rock’n’roll would “reduce the white man to the level of the negro”. Sadly, they have made an album that all but justifies Bloom’s contempt.
Gareth Vile
