English novelists have a fascination with history. Yet at times it must be more rewarding to create a new one, than painstakingly research the elder scrolls to get it right. Tom Holt wrote multiple novels with a magical bend before secretly historical-based fantasy as K.J. Parker. For 17 years, these identities and their output were separate, allowing Holt to continue to develop in two directions without causing whiplash in his fanbase.
Beginning in 1998 with The Fencer Trilogy, Parker's "workmanlike" prose made the adventures of a past life into adventure. Where Rebecca Yarros' version of a military school in her whisk-you-away dark academia-based Romantasy feels familial. Parker's post-Roman Empire rumblings work because he makes you feel like it is you against this tribal world.
In "Sixteen Ways To Defend a Walled City" his main character (who you will inhabit) is Orhan, a simple engineer with a past. Orhan is a simple man, but there is an innate charm in how he is honest about his intent and about using almost-illegal ways to maintain it. For instance, the government in his world is clearly faceless and uses obfuscation as a means of controlling the system while promoting it as one without so many rules. Orhan sums up his own life with ruthless efficiency: orphaned, drafted into the military and taught to be an engineer almost out of good luck. Yet, luck does not necessarily act as his divining rod. In the opening disaster, he is merely asking for directions to get out of this city that is going up in flames. He is stabbed with a sword before he can even finish his question, but takes it all in stride wisely placing his thoughts about how to survive ahead of ruminating over why he is suffering.
There is something intriguing about placing a so-called "simple" man in the middle of levels of chaos and dispirited people. Like Robert Graves' "I, Claudius," we see a character who knows the business from the ground up - but only moves from one stratum to another out of necessity. Furthermore, it is the necessity (and not ambition) that elicits change as Orhan's "I must" is honestly a "We must." In Holt/Parker's hands, Orhan's leadership is knowingly fragile but keeps him at a distance. In short, he is a results-based man converting his take of gold to silver to pay his growing band of men is more complex than communicating with them, a task that Holt/Parker briefly judges by how he is approached or his men grow silent when he walks up to their campfire.
I tend to keep my thoughts to myself, which is why I scowl a lot, but sometimes it's nice to have someone to think out loud at.
What is not clear (and made to be that way) is how certain portions of our history of Civilisation (watch the Kenneth Burke documentary) are blended together to build this world and then watch it naturally descend into conflict with itself. Holt/Parker leads you along, all while using Orhan to ask questions as to how great ideas (the rival Themes) grow into worse entities with more money and therefore more power. It is almost as if he is hiding behind his nom de plume not to shield his identity, but to make certain that the books fight the rising tide of pre-release expectations.
A story is a story, and this one is riveting and well-constructed. Holt/Parker asks a lot of Orhan and that factor makes the seams of "Fantasy adventure" or "Military adventure" less obvious. This is not meant to read like his life. In the moments captured by the book, Orhan is always calling himself stupid or taking a blind swipe at the reality of multiple cultures trying to live together by acknowledging his humanity and humility. So, "Sixteen Ways" manages to avoid being episodic or even diaristic to move the evolution of Orhan along without collecting escalating battles or even too many notable cliffhanger moments like a board game/videogame. "Sixteen Ways" is a hero's tale that reads where the hero can be anyone.
NEW MUSIC THIS WEEK
HARRY STYLES - Kiss All The Time. Disco, Occasionally. [LP+POSTER/CD](Columbia)
You're one of the biggest Pop stars in the world. You've had a few years away making movies, touring, riding the wave of three worldwide #1/multi-Platinum albums. No need to change the formula too much, Kid Harpoon is back as a collaborator. The twelve songs here do need to reflect experience. Maybe not of the last four years, but the last three albums. Follow your new Electronic music inspirations Robyn and LCD Soundsystem, open the "Aperture" to its widest and all will be revealed Thursday at 11:01PM.
TBONES will be hosting a LISTENING PARTY for the fourth Harry Styles album with rabid fans and more on Friday, March 6th at 6PM.
DENZEL CURRY AND THE SCYTHE - Strictly 4 The Scythe [TANGERINE LP/CD](Loma Vista)
$UICIDEBOY$ - Thy Will Be Done [LP/CD](*G59/The Orchard)
Forget about their beginnings in Miami (Curry) and New Orleans ($uicideboys,) the modern day Hip-Hop finds its roots in Memphis and Houston circa the Nineties. Curry's new supergroup The Scythe boasts a variety of voices (A$AP Ferg, Tia Corine, Bktharula, and Key Nyata) but they honestly rap as one. The backdrops are serpentine and slow rolling as Curry dives back into Three 6 Mafia style spitting. $uicideboys are no strangers to the Three 6 (their year-long series of true mixtapes is their best output overall.) "Thy Will Be Done" almost purposefully kicks out with the Memphis roll they have using for the last few albums before expanding into an H-Town sample-based burner ("Angel Grove") followed by a slippery Emo song ("Whatever Floats Your Boat Will Definitely Sink My Ship.") But adding Jazz samples, children chanting and singing to the brilliant "Old Addicts, New Habits" hints toward a new 504 sound.
MORRISSEY - Make-Up Is A Lie [BLUE LP/RED LP/CD/CS](Sire/London/Rhino)
A lot can happen in six years. Morrissey has long been a witness to change, but rarely absorbed it as much as here. Largely autobiographical and purposely far away from the familiar chime of The Smiths, "Make-Up Is A Lie" is Morrissey being dramatic (the swooning title cut) sometimes over strings and orchestration sounding like a Bond villain. While at others ("Lester Bangs" and the offhand Roxy Music tribute "Amazonas,") he is addressing himself in the past like Cassandra firing off one final warning. As the record draws to a close, for the first time in YEARS we hear him clamor for something more than merely being heard as he waxes on the drawing of the proverbial curtain ("Many Icebergs Ago") before handing a stern judgement to the music industry at large ("The Monsters of Pig Alley.") Don't be surprised, if #14 does not hit, the 66-year old crooner is at his level best when no one seems to care.
DARKTHRONE - Fist in the Face [9LP+DVD](Peaceville UK/The Orchard)
As we have discussed before, Norwegian Black Metal is a dangerous variant. Rooted in the highly compressed production of the Flemming Rasmussen years of Metallica, and dosed full of Sabbath-era Doom, and the growl of early Thrash and Death (these guys started in that realm back in 1986,) Darkthrone is exemplary of foundational aesthetics and non-rigid growth. "Fist In The Face" dares to condense 40 years into their best nine albums and a bonus DVD. So, we will be concise. The first four albums ("A Blaze In The Northern Sky," "Under a Funeral Moon," "Transilvanian Hunger" and its coda "Panzerfaust") are necessities to any Metal fan. From the depths of their grainy 4-track recorder, there is a ghostly noise that is the only constant as the one-time quartet evolves. "Kathaarian Life Code" incorporates Speed Metal to the point the sounds whirr by you like the blur of an apparition. While the more economical "The Dance of Eternal Shadows" is both majestic and melodic. When the dust clears, Darkthrone is and will always be Fenriz and Nocturno Culto.
The transitional phase is clouded by the changes in Metal around them. With a first act that pays homage/deconstructs Black Metal, they grow into a more muscular unit (the NWOBHM-esque "Black Victory of Death" from "Total Death") and blast through riffs while using effects to create vapor trails around the deathly snarl. "Ravishing Grimness" exists as further refinement but unveils some true surprises (the 3/4 swing of "Lifeless" and the melodic "The Claws of Time.") As their tenure with Moonfog Records was drawing to a close, the set's final albums, especially "Sardonic Wrath" begin drawing more from Punk influences ("In Honour of Thy Name" from "Hate Them") and classic Metal ("Alle Gegen Alle" from "Sardonic Wrath" oozes Doom as it builds toward it conclusion,) yet maintain their Black Metal elements.
When you leave the Darkthrone rollercoaster here circa 2005, it is almost unimaginable those noticeable alterations to their sound on these later record are about to direct them toward another blistering run of classics in 2019's "Old Star" and 2021's "Eternal Hails......" However, that is Darkthrone defying the unwritten rules of Black Metal to make room for yet another band willing to growl mercilessly as far over (or under) the speed limit that they can travel.
Mik Davis is the record store manager at T-Bones Records & Cafe in Hattiesburg.
