In my email communication with the relevant PR, I was given a download link, along with the words: “If you fancy a fresh dive into Farm (and why wouldn’t you!)“
I did fancy that. And what’s more, it was a very fresh dive into it indeed, as my son was born in 2009, the year of its release, so I was somewhat preoccupied and there’s rather a gaping hole in my musical knowledge around that time. So this, in fact, is the first time I’ve ever heard Farm, and, lucky me, having been sent the double album release on luminous lime green vinyl, I can honestly say it’s a magnificent record.
It comes bursting into the room right from the off, with the glorious swagger of the effervescent ‘Pieces‘ which, despite its ravishing rock elegance, is delivered by the inimitable frontman J Mascis in his most vulnerable, fractured vocal that is both beautiful and utterly compelling.
This is carried on through the Pearl Jam meets Buffalo Tom fuzziness of ‘I Want You To Know‘ – another powerhouse of a song – and the more restrained ‘Ocean In The Way‘, which is more like the kind of thing Patterson Hood might have composed for the formidable Drive-By Truckers. It’s one heck of a triple whammy that gets Farm up and running, but while albums often suffer from being so ‘front-loaded’, not a bit of it here! If anything, it gets even better, with the gorgeous ‘Plans‘, Mascis’s guitar work simply mesmerising on this one, the delightful Pixies-like vocal phrasing of ‘Your Weather‘ (in the verses, at least) and the intoxicating exuberance of ‘Over It’.
We’re halfway through the album and the band hasn’t put a foot wrong yet. ‘Friends‘ is a little more throwaway but a lot of fun, almost like a Rolling Stones record if you stripped away all the clutter and chaos, and ‘Said The People‘ might just be one of the best tracks in DJ’s already mighty canon, a somewhat tortured ballad divided at the midway point by one of the most achingly poignant guitar solos you’re ever likely to hear.
‘There’s No Here‘ keeps up the intensity and ‘See You‘ is pretty enough, but the eight-and-a-half minute ‘I Don’t Wanna Go There‘ is just wonderful, expansive and wrought with emotion. It would befit any album as a closing track, yet we still have ‘Imagination Blind‘ to do that for us, which is a great, searing tune, but I can’t shake the feeling that those last two songs need to be swapped around.
As a bonus, on this anniversary edition, and appearing for the first time on vinyl, we have Dinosaur Jr.’s rather lovely take on the old Zombies number ‘Whenever You’re Ready‘, the catchy, kind of folksy ‘Houses‘, the splendidly noisy instrumental ‘Creepies‘ and the one minute oddity that is ‘Show‘.
None of the tracks on Farm are worth less than an 8/10 rating. Having been a ‘Farm virgin’ until very recently, I can now say, however, having heard the album many times over in the past couple of weeks, that it’s not just a great record, it’s one of the best of that entire decade.
