Noteworthy: October frights: perfume | HubCitySPOKES

He possessed the power. He held it in his hand. A power stronger than the power of money or the power of terror or the power of death: the invincible power to command the love of mankind. There was only one thing that power could not do: it could not make him able to smell himself.

October’s chilly nights usher in the need for books that keep us tantalized and consistently saturated with fright and thrills. However, not all works of the Horror genre function in the macabre and/or scary dark corners of Literature. Many of them draw us into their lair with the promise of sensations and intense human experiences.

1985’s “Perfume” by Patrick Süskind is a generous piece of Historical Fiction. Generous because the belief that it could happen generates the belief that it did happen. Jean-Baptiste Grenouille was a French orphan in the 18th Century. Born in 1738 into a world unloved, Jean is a child who largely lives alone. So Süskind unsympathetically puts us in his place. With no one to communicate with or even grow socially, Jean learns he has a special gift that puts him above everyone. Of course, gifts can be a blessing or a curse – or both.

This liminal existence makes Jean very anonymous and almost unnoticeable. However, in his mind, Jean has a great talent for smell. He can smell and identify rotten vegetables, the grimy streets of Paris, and the great unwashed sinking into poor health and the perils of penury in the growing shadow of the guillotine. Süskind’s elegant description of all that “stank” is such a barrage of sense-related verbiage, the implication that smell is one sense that is inescapable. The importance of this sense actually gives “Perfume” its rising action. In the hands of the wet nurse, Jean’s inability to possess a “smell” makes him a product of nefarious means. Turned over to a skeptical priest, Father Terrier, innocence reveals Jean’s talent as both sinister (“a hostile animal “) and oddly natural.

Süskind builds foreshadowing into his characterization of Jean by comparing him to a tick. Every detail in his portrait in leading to the chilling conclusion of our protagonist perhaps craving blood. The description is not inhuman, Süskind also makes him a “survivor” – yet not necessarily one to be admired. The rolling motion of the words and images here almost beg for the chilling strike of haunted strings. “Perfume” is not only densely plotted but continues to ratchet up an old-style Gothic Horror formula. In our hands, we as readers know what is going to happen – but not how. Süskind is slowly gearing up Hitchcockian suspense that is hard to tear yourself away from.

As a young man walking in Paris crowded teeming with filth streets and alleys, Jean is transfixed by a scent like no other. A young girl. An adolescent. Brimming with life and glorious red hair. This scent possesses him like never before. He consumes it in every inhalation and holds on to it both for its mystery and the euphoria it feeds. Before you know it, Jean has murdered the young girl – wanting only the smell for himself. In a twist worthy of Greek tragedy, Jean quickly discovers the intoxicating smell disappeared when she gasped for her last breath. In a flash, his entire chilling character unfolds. A child unwanted (Süskind earlier described him as “1 of 10000 in the city born that day) then passed around and finally left alone with its own devices, is now a murderer. Without reason but a significant backstory, we “know” Jean but we are far from sympathetic.

As “Perfume” further winds up the tension, Jean takes a job working for a Parfumier who teaches him this craft. Süskind crosses the wires of this tutelage, the master he is learning from Baldini sees him as a prodigy but we know as readers that he is consumed with another goal. Still, Jean’s talent takes its own duplicitous turn as he manufactures and improves on the high-demand product of one of Baldini’s rivals. In the end, Baldini urges Jean to study the art further and then dies when his shop sinks into the Seine. While there is no chance of this really following this sequence of events, the fact that death is now following Jean,

With all the sudden focus on serial killers and these sociopaths who committed heinous crimes, “Perfume” dates back to a time when sudden urbanization, Draconian law, and objective poverty did more than damage several strata of society. It created a cold-blooded killer and gave him an all-consuming raison d’etre. While “Perfume” may get violent and fiendishly descriptive in its action, one cannot help but read with an understanding (again, not sympathy) for Jean’s talent as it grows into a compulsion. Modern Horror works best when following Science Fiction’s facet of mirroring our own world and “Perfume” accurately uses the past to show us a life of darkness is not a life in any period of time.

Mik Davis is the record store manager at T-Bones Records & Cafe in Hattiesburg.

New This Week

ALVVAYS – Blue Rev [LP/CD/CS](Polyvinyl/Secretly/AMPED)

In the eight years since their debut, Alvvays have matured into meaningful songwriters. “Blue Rev” marries the romantic abandon of their 2014 self-titled album (“Archie, Marry Me”) with the multifaceted production and ideas that presented themselves on 2017’s ” Antisocialites.” While still alarmingly clever, the songs on “Blue Rev” (the earlier 90’s drenched guitar waver on “Easy On Your Own?”) say much more with fewer words.

BONNY LIGHT HORSEMAN – Rolling Golden Holy [LP/CD/CS](37d03d/Secretly/AMPED)

The assonance of its title signals that the Folk explorations of Eric D. Johnson, Josh Kaufman, and Anais Mitchell are growing more modern (“Exile”) and less traditional (their standout cover of “Green Rocky Road” from 2020.) Kaufman’s warm funky sound makes a lot more room for the twin vocals of Johnson and Mitchell. “Summer Dream” feels breezy letting its images float through your brain with the melodies. “Someone To Weep For Me” uses its Folk instrumentation to sound sincere and optimistic, while the slinky “Sweetbread” updates its classic imagery (“Jack of Diamonds”) to unveil a great chorus. “Rolling Golden Holy” feels more like a dreamy trip through Folk than their previous works, a trip well worth taking.

COURTNEY MARIE ANDREWS – Loose Future [LP/CD](Fat Possum/The Orchard)

With her dreamy voice, Courtney Marie Andrews furthers herself from the typical Americana with an album that mixes the Seventies Country/Rock/Pop edge of her voice with some wispy far-out near Psychedelia from Sam Evian. Like the Young Guv record from this summer (totally underrated “III and IV,”) these are songs that send you skyward but Andrews’ earthy Emmylou warble keeps it earthy.

LAMB OF GOD – Omens [LP/CD](Epic)

GOATWHORE – Angels Hung From The Arches of Heaven

[LP/CD](Metal Blade/The Orchard)

Lamb of God is no stranger to brutal bashing Metal. However, “Omens” may be the closest they have come yet to an album that yields Active Rock commercial promise (“Grayscale” and even an edited title track would blow the dust off most of the contenders there.) Randy Blythe’s guttural howl/yowl is mixed so clearly, his bracing words come across as crystal clear. That is good news because while “Omens” is another lockdown-era dystopian lash out at the world – the apocalyptic imagery works perfectly against their Metallica-esque tough riffage.

On the flip side, New Orleans extreme Metallers celebrate their 25th year with an almost Hardcore-speed Death Metal-esque flight over a burning world. Like a muscular and angry Venom, “Death From Above” chugs through chainsaw riffs and runs before reaching ramming speed for its conclusion. “Angels” gets impossibly fast and its frenetic pace simply cannot stop the rage this beast is here to unleash.

REISSUES OF THE WEEK

MAC MILLER – Macadelic [LP](Rostrum)

When “college rapper” was a bad name, Mac Miller emerged with a sound that inspired fun and lyrics that could even be introspective. After the smash success of his debut “Blue Slide Park,” Mac returned with his first album dominated by his own compositions and welcomed a colossal set of guests including Juicy J, Joey Bada$$, Lil Wayne, and Kendrick Lamar. Now 10 years later, this special limited edition vinyl edition of his seventh mixtape and the first (of many) hit singles.

JONI MITCHELL – Blue [LP](Reprise/Rhino)

After Joni Mitchell had twisted her Folk roots into more Jazzy melodicism (all buoyed by her rhythmic thrust and sweet voice,) she made one of the first truly “female” singer/songwriter albums. Her fourth album 1971’s “Blue” brought it all home . Passion (“A Case of You,”) love (“California,”) loneliness (“Little Green,”) and salvation (“Blue”) are all still presented here in startling Technicolor. Her poetic lyrics would never be better and the pauses and holds that she brought with her from her Folkie days were never more powerful. Like 1971’s “Tapestry” by Carole King, “Blue” remains a chronicle of women waking up to a world where had to take power. Sadly, not on Spotify.

CARS – Candy-O [LP]/Panorama [LP](Elektra/Rhino)

After their smash success (and perfect) debut album, Boston’s Cars vaulted to the head of the class in post-Punk “New Wave” re-branding. Inventive and as sleek as their cover art, “Candy-O” is more classic in parts than its cover. With their debut as a definitive “radio” album, “Candy-O” looks ahead. “Let’s Go” is one of their best singles ever, propulsive without trying. “It’s All I Can Do” is Power Pop pure and simple backlit with their crisp harmonies and a blistering guitar solo from Elliott Easton. However, once they get the “hits” out of the way, “Candy-O” gels around foreign sounds (the Suicide-inspired “Shoo Be Doo” peaks brilliantly into the muscular chime of the title cut) and elegant hipster satire (“Night Spots” and “Lust For Kicks” which present themselves as “cool” but actually makes fun of their supercilious ways.) Still, it manages to hide two of The Cars’ brief deep cuts (“Got A Lot In My Head” and the shimmering “You Can’t Hold On Too Long”) and the sparkling T.Rex-ia n closer “Dangerous Type.” Of course, “Candy-O” was not tuned to hit the heights of the debut – but it pushes them in a new direction just in time for the odometer to turn over into another decade.

VENOM – Black Metal [LP](RSD Essentials/Sanctuary)

Celebrating its 40th anniversary, this British NWOBHM classic could have reduced the subgenre to dust. In the quest to sing higher, scream louder, and play faster, Newcastle’s inadvertently invented “Black Metal” on their second album. Gritty and thunderous, the trio puts the pedal to the metal on most of the songs. “Black Metal,” “To Hell and Back” and “Raise The Dead” still rise above their “atmospheric” recording to sail along at post-Motorhead speed with a wealth of punched- in guitar solos that push the needle further into the red. When they released this album in 1982, Venom was really out to top the current crop of NWOBHM bands who were growing stale. However, they did not know that Metallica and Slayer (they would open for them on the “Ride The Lightning” tour in 1984 were taking notice as “Black Metal” sowed the seeds for Thrash and Death Metal.