No doubt the band’s choice of name – made way back in 1983 – was cheekily ironic, and it’s not bad as far as band names go. But I’d also bet no member of the Canadian quintet knew how ironically accurate the name would become.
The Tragically Hip are marketed all over North America as an alternative band erring on the side of accessibility, where in fact they are an MOR band with the occasional éclat of leftfield artistry. Hiply tragic.
If further proof is needed, check their choice of producer, Hugh Padgham. His previous work reads like an awareness leaflet on bad adult pop: Sting, Genesis, Phil Collins, Simple Minds, Vanessa Carlton, Melissa Etheridge. Sure enough, the lily-livered opening track ‘Are You Ready’ does not augur well for the next forty minutes: heavily-reverbed snare and emasculated instrumentation place us firmly back on the road to ’80s hell.
We never quite get there, thankfully. Vocalist Gordon Downie is skillful and soulful, and this comes across despite Padgham’s best efforts to cut his balls off. Stipe-like in both ideas and delivery, Downie croons/yowls life back into otherwise dull songs like ‘Leave’ and ‘Silver Jet’.
Clearly, The Hip are significantly more interesting lyrically than musically. They even manage to pepper In Violet Light’s libretto with contemporary literary references without coming across as pseuds.
In Violet Light is not an irredeemably bad album, it’s just that The Tragically Hip are so busy being earnest and honest and adult that they barely remember to tack a hummable melody or memorable groove onto the end product. Final track ‘The Dark Canuck’ is the most promising, a bleak and surreal call-to-arms in two movements: “In the clouds of blood at the end of Jaws/In the misted cars honking their applause.../At the heart of dark enough/O it’s Jaws and The Dark Canuck.”
This direction, and the shooting out of a cannon into the sun of Hugh Padgham in favour of, say, Andy Wallace or Nigel Godrich, would herald a bright future for TTH. Meanwhile, the first verse of ‘A Beautiful Thing’ diagnoses this album: “Time and where it went/Unremarkable events.”