Barbara Morgenstern: The Operator

Three long years have gone by since Barbara Morgenstern released her 2003 pop album, Nichts Muss. Her album-length collaborations with Robert Lippok (2005’s Tesri) and Stefan Schneider (2004’s September Collective, with Paul Wirkus as well) were very much more experimental in nature than the sparkling and deeply expressive pop of her solo records. As much as I enjoy experimental music, those previously mentioned records included, I guess from Morgenstern what I really dig is her use of melody and harmony in more melodic, song-structured and meticiously arranged settings. With her new single, “The Operator,” she shows us that she certainly hasn’t lost her sense of melody or harmony, and if anything her amazing power of arrangement has gotten better. The single edit (the full length version will be on her upcoming album, The Grass Is Always Greener) starts off in an almost-funky groove, with the bass popping off the organ line, then builds up into an upbeat, yet tense affair. Building up with a Vermona ET 6-1 organ sound and then exploding into an orgiastic frenzy (when she sings ‘Take me to the operator, to discuss some questions’) Barbara sounds both pleasant and mournful. It's an irresistable combination.

A ‘piano version’ follows. The song now has even more of a surreal feel with its stark overall tone, calliope-echoing piano lines and bubble-like pitched electronics panning across both speakers. Barbara’s voice is still overdubbed, and still airy and tense. Interestingly though it can’t help but elicit joy, regardless of its overall dissonance and jaunty feel.

The last track on this single is one that will not be on her forthcoming album, The Grass is Always Greener, called “Mein Elektrisches Tier.” It’s a typical (in the best way) Morgenstern minor-key melody, in the style of “We’re All Gonna Fucking Die” from Nichts Muss but MUCH shorter — it’s so unfortunate that it is only one minute and fourty-three seconds. As good as it is, the brevity makes it come off like a really great fragment of a really great song, instead of a song in its own right.

All pop fans are going to want this. Others might want to wait until the release of The Grass Is Always Greener: if this won’t do it, the version of “The Operator” on that will blow your mind.

— Thor Maillet, March 29th, 2006.