Last October I saw Paul de Jong perform inside a Brooklyn synagogue. In between songs, he shared news of his upcoming album. “You Fucken Sucker. That’s what it’s called.” Nervous laughter ensued. The Dutch-American cellist and composer comes across as quiet, gentle, a bit dorky. To hear he was moving in a darker, more confrontational direction was enticing, if not a bit puzzling.
If you’ve heard anything from de Jong, likely you’ve heard his contributions as one half of the Books, the sample-heavy folktronica sound collage project with a Ram Dass-meets-workout tape aesthetic. The duo made beautiful and strange explorations over its fruitful four-record career in the aughts, one I would sincerely recommend to any curious listener. While not devoid of message, the Books’ music tends to dive too deeply into abstraction and whimsy to be obvious commentary. And while the music brims with emotional content, it’s doesn’t feel like personal expression. That’s not the case with de Jong’s second solo effort You Fucken Sucker.
It’s got the buzzy jittery propulsion of the Books but is far less warm and cozy. The liner notes describe de Jong as channeling that overwhelmed sense of hyper-stimulation and frustration one tends to feel in this day and age—”societal frustration… compounded by a series of unexpected and frightening personal turns.” And it’s evident from the very start. The pleasant groove of the opener “Embowelment” is soon overtaken by an interlocking cacophony of screams and shouts. Already, de Jong seems ready to burst out of his skin.
The great power of evoking sampled speech lies in the unique ability to speak through the voices of others—in this case, to express extreme feelings. Here, de Jong chops up and strings together recordings, twisting words, subverting messages, and emphasizing irony, paradox, and hypocrisy—always packing the maximum metaphysical punch. Listening to You Fucken Sucker, you may become curious how de Jong gained access to such up close and personal recordings. They’re so intimate; one has to wonder if some of these sounds are not repurposed but rather recorded expressly for this project. We could ask de Jong, but sometimes it’s more fun to stay in the dark. As with that of the Books, one of the great strengths of this music is the way he uses these voices, the cast of characters he assembles.
“Dimples” and its prelude “Doings” are all about self-actualization, the turbulent merry-go-round of apathy and inspiration. In front of sampled “Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do’s”, “do it’s”, and a teacherly female voice of encouragement is the chorus: “I don’t enjoy what I’m doing / It has all been done before / Now someone else has got to do it / I don’t want to do it anymore.” It’s ennui and exhaustion, motivation and obligation, and fear of creative redundancy. To that, Paul would add: “anger, frustration, misery, and confusion”. These set the tone for the entire record, and the opposing dialog between the male subject and this female voice persists. Many of us probably have that strong drive to do something no else has done because no one else has done it, and surely many of us have those two voices: the one that builds you up and the one that knocks you down. I certainly do. Here’s where de Jong’s album shines. You Fucken Sucker has a clear conceptual through-line… which is good because stylistically, it’s all over the map.
Unwieldy sample selection aside, it’s still one of the more eclectic records in recent memory. De Jong shows great ease in touring us through musical and non-musical places alike, and in this way, he more closely assumes the role of a sound artist than of musician. But eclecticism is a double-edged sword. De Jong, more than most, is all too aware of the expansive sonic palette before him, and so he must contend with the infinity of choice. We all know how paralyzing that can be.
“Pipe Dream” and takes us into the ambient realm, “The Jar Bell” into minimalism, and “Wavehoven” somewhere in between; “Johnny No Cash” is a kind of Nick Cave blues tune from space; “The Wind” and “Doomed” have crushing, King Crimson moments. It gets weirder. The approachable title track sounds like the theme music to a web series to set in Williamsburg—all very nice. Over acoustic guitar, a breathy female vocalist interpolates “Mary Had a Little Lamb”, ending each stanza with a sweetly crooned: “mother-fucker, father-fucker, sister-fucker, brother fucker / you fucken sucker.” The way she emphases “fucker” each time really gets at the crux of the album for me: that fierce ambivalence between gentle and venomous, sexual undertones dappling You Fucken Sucker—and we’re not even talking about “Let’s Talk About Sex”.
Of all these tracks, the charged “Doomed” best weaves the threads of anger and defiance that bring balance to the omnipresent cynicism. After some shredding, a washed-out texture with the accompanying mantra “I can do anything I want to / It’s up to me” segues into an Eastern European folk style as children spew vulgarities of “fuck you up your ass” and the like. (By this point, I was genuinely afraid to listen to this record on the subway for fear others would think I was listening to some kind of torture porn… though we can’t exactly dock points for that.) It concludes with “You can be anything you want to be”, sung twice in a sardonic, Barney-esque polka, then once in a demonic Gregorian chant. Though a wonderful tune, it’s an example of the many missed opportunities that haunt this release. I so wish de Jong had eased the transition from peppy to satanic, drawn it out another 45 seconds. One gets the impression de Jong is nervous about committing too strongly to certain ideas, but all too often, he overcompensates, leaving us wanting more.
The seven-minute finale “Breaking Up” quickly moves from unsettling to unbearable, dashing any hope of a happy ending. (But rest easy knowing the “fuck you up your ass” motif returns.) Atop a free improv percussion track comes a stream of hysterical obscenities, what sounds like the demo of a young woman rehearsing for a deeply disturbed theater role. It’s quite brilliant, really.
Sadly, You Fucken Sucker largely lacks the confidence necessary for a project so ambitious. Too often, ideas are understated or cut short, to the point You Fucken Sucker feels like a thoughtful collection of sketches. De Jong has proven himself an artist who benefits, and benefits from, collaborators. His secret spice works delectably in the recipes of others, but his own recipes don’t quite fulfill their flavorful potential. Not to say de Jong shouldn’t go it solo—but he could really use a creative director to reassure him and occasionally steer him away from cul-de-sacs. The concept, though poignant, doesn’t hold together the work on its own, and the stylistic shifts aren’t always supported by a logical progression. All that said, he deserves our sincere respect for the way he delivers raw emotion and introspection, no easy feat when speaking through the voices of others.
If his work with the Books has taught us anything, it’s that, if you’re going to be eclectic, you ought to be vibrant. And sadly, de Jong does not quite achieve the latter—save for the colorful sample material. Then again, maybe de Jong doesn’t feel like being vibrant. He makes it no secret he’s unhappy—with himself and probably the rest of us—at a time when it feels like the world’s gone up in flames and we’re all just standing here like suckers. …Which begs the question: Who exactly is de Jong calling a sucker? Is he speaking to us? Is it the voice within speaking to him? I have a feeling de Jong would say we’re all fucken suckers.