Magnetic Fields | DISTORTION | CD

Personnel: Shirley Simms (vocals); John Woo (guitar); Sam Davol (cello); Daniel Handler (accordion); Claudia Gonson (piano, Farfisa, drums, background vocals).Audio Mixers: Tom Rogers; Stephin Merritt; Charles Newman.Recording information: Mother West, NY.Photographer: Marcelo Krasilcic.From the beginning, every Magnetic Fields album has had a specific musical or thematic concept: for example, 1991's DISTANT PLASTIC TREES was a tribute to synth minimalists Young Marble Giants, 1994's THE CHARM OF THE HIGHWAY STRIP was influenced by country-music road songs, and of course 1999's 69 LOVE SONGS was self-explanatory. DISTORTION, as the title suggests, is a glorious mess of feedback, surface noise, and other forms of distortion that sounds like a throwback to singer-songwriter and mastermind Stephin Merritt's indie-rock roots, before his later incarnation as a generational answer to Irving Berlin's pop classicism. The songs themselves are highly reminiscent of the early Magnetic Fields; "Ca