Not Such a Wonderful Life

Mark Linkous, aka Sparklehorse, commited suicide this weekend. The man had great talent for creating melancholy alt-blues songs that were at the same moment delicate, mysterious and folksy. If you've never heard anything by Sparklehorse imagine the slow melodies of Cowboy Junkies and Mazzy Star mixing with the reverberating soothe of Portishead, the intimate resignation blues of Tom Waits. The mood is dark, but earnest. Think Sea Changes Beck.

Back in 2002 a friend gave me "It's a Wonderful Life," Sparklehorse's fourth release. I remember finding the album artwork fascinating, in a romantically understated way, and combined with the "lo-fi, decaying, Waitsian-music-box gloom" of the songs, it reminded me of something I could imagine listening to while spending an emotionally raw night in an old Victorian castle, with candles and tapestries and shadows on the move. But I couldn't get into it. The album was too slow for my taste. It's the kind of thing you listen to when depressed and looking to steep yourself further into self-pity.

Even then, however, he had good taste in collaborators: Waits, Nina Persson, and PJ Harvey all sing on the album.

His most recent work, a collaboration with Danger Mouse called "Dark Night of the Soul", has been making its way around the internet for months, though the creators had been in a battle with EMI over its release. "Dark Night" features performances by The Shins, Julian Casablancas, Black Francis, The Flaming Lips, Iggy Pop, Suzanne Vega, and more, and is now expected to be released this summer.

In 1996, while on tour opening for Radiohead, Linkous got so wasted on booze and anti-depressants that he passed out in an awkward position on top of his legs for fourteen hours; the resulting damage caused him to spend the next six months in a wheelchair. Then this final act was the inevitable culmination of yet another cliched rock n'roll suicide, I guess. Or maybe it was just another lonely man giving up.

In an age where you can remake your life in infinite ways, I can't imagine why all these talented musicians keep killing themselves just as they are on the cusp of musical immortality (see Jeff Buckley, Shannon Hoon, Elliott Smith) but it sucks, and it's stupid. I hate to be so judgmental, but most people go through their entire lives without finding a way to creatively express their vision and pain and yet these men, who had found their outlet, managed to squander their talent, the life given to them, and the millions of admirers who appreciated their work no matter how sad and dark it became. To be fair, Buckley drowned accidentally, and Hoon died of an accidental overdose, but both knew the danger in those final risky leaps they took, and they took them anyway.

If you want to know a little more about Sparklehorse, check out this early article.

Here's the best song off the soon-to-be released"Dark Night of the Soul":

Next is the title track off his 2001 album. Beware: this is one of those choruses that will stick in your head for a few days.

Also, please note that both these videos are fan created. It's the best I could find.