HIGH HORSES

Apparently, The Residents have always had this love for carousel music. So they made an EP of carousel sounding music, which is made in 3-D so that it sounds like you are going around in circles on a carousel. Usually, music for a carousel is programmed by holes punched into a card and fed into a machine which produces the sound as it reads the card. The Residents did the same thing, but used a computer to read the card, hence the music you hear on this album.

This is an E.P that is about 18 minutes long, and that is long enough. Any longer and it would have worn out it's welcome. The crazy thing is that a limited amount of the EP was made and then sold for over 20 dollars. Kind of a rip off I suppose, but then Residents fans just had to have it.

Overall, it's not a bad album and it's not as annoying as you would think. The tunes are interesting enough, but other than the strange concept and the odd music, this isn't much in the way of being progressive. It is a fun novelty though, I suppose, but any more than 18 minutes would have been too much, so the brevity of the album works to it's benefit. However, you probably will have a hard time finding this one. It is available on one of their many collections, but it's probably hard to find that way too.

The tracks are divided into 6 parts with no distinguishing names except for Part 1, Part 2 and so on. The music sounds a lot like it's electronic and it is all programmed. Other than the carnival stylings and feelings, there are some synthesized, wordless vocals in Part 5 which gives you a feeling of the carousel spinning down into Hell. This moves us into Part 6 which is actually more of a progressive track, but it still keeps the overall sound, but it gets somewhat chaotic and out of control and ends with an evil clown laughing.

So, it's not just calliope music, but there are other electronic sounds also, sometimes playing along with the melody and other times driving it along. There is electronic percussion throughout the music also. Of course you got to get the strange humor of The Residents in there. There is a dark thread throughout the entire EP, so you get the overall feeling that, even though a carousel is a happy ride at a funpark, in this case, it sounds like it belongs in Ray Bradbury's "Something Wicked This Way Comes". There is something evil just lurking under the surface.

Again, it's not as bad as it sounds and thank goodness it is short. They didn't draw this experiment out too long, but they did overcharge for the EP and I'm not sure what they were trying to accomplish with that except for the strange alienation they always attempt with the masses, but which always seems to draw their fans (or cult following) after everything they produce. There is a little bit of genius to this wackiness, so I have to give it 3 stars. If it were any longer though, I would have had to give it less than that. I know, it's main drawback (the shortness of the album) is one of it's strengths. Go figure. But it is The Residents after all.