Writing about the music that John Beckmann makes as Mortal Prophets is less like preparing to put pen to paper on behalf of just another record; it is more like suiting up to visit whole other worlds, real and imagined, and often the space in between. With the feeling that his releases are connected only by a sense of artistic and boundary-pushing adventure, dropping the needle on the record is akin to stepping through a sonic portal to…well… wherever.
As the title suggests, this is the music of the liminal spaces, not just made in those places where genres meet, overlap, and blur, but also describing similar physical places: empty nighttime streets and shadow-strewn alleys, moonwashed halls and silent roads, places where the existence of humanity feels like an intrusive stranger and an environment of their own making.
It is also a place that is achingly romantic, as displayed by the brace of songs “Where Love Goes To Die” and “Love is Found,” – the former an urgent, undulating piece of electronica capturing those signs and sighs and silences that abound as relationships fade, the latter its redemptive opposite side of the coin, brooding and beautiful, a reminder that love is found when you merely open yourself to the idea, rather than chase it. Intimate, haunting, and optimistic, in its own dark and delicious way.
“Franz Xaver Messerschmidt” might be an unusual choice for a song subject, the sort of theme that the likes of Art Schop might pick. But that sculptor’s beguiling statues, pieces which use the grace of his art to depict the grotesque of the human condition, seem the perfect juxtaposition to reflect The Mortal Prophets’ own sonic oppositions and experiment. “I Can Feel Your Heartbeat’s” more 60 ‘s-inspired, power-popping, then making for a welcome change of mood.
“Real Person Too” is an electro-funky piece of post-punkery, its almost tribal groove reminding us of the likes of Talking Heads, its raw and resonant sounds evoking The Pop Group, and “Where Language Ends” discusses the limitation of word-based communication and that sometimes the silence power of body language and intuition, ironically, speaks volumes.
Not Here, Not There reminds us that music is many things. It is more than just a song; that lyrics, I mean, real, meaningful, poetic lyrics, are essential, that at its best, music contains ideas that stay with you after the last chord fades, that it paints pictures, reflects mood in its melody, and sets scenes, and that it talks to us on an emotional level as well as through literal words. This is an album where the best of all those elements collide, and do so brilliantly.
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