Pitchfork

Oh, Mark, you sly devil. I see that double entendre in your new album title. Anyone with a passing familiarity with your work could guess it's just another morbidly humorous jab at yourself, like the title of your last full-length of new material, The Invisible Man. Ah, but further research reveals the true back story here-- The Ugly American was recorded in Greece, with a band of local musicians playing mostly traditional instruments. You're still poking fun at yourself, but this time it's more specifically aimed at your temporary expatriation. Mark, I don't wanna accuse you of being in a holding pattern or anything, because I hear you're writing stuff for a new album, but two albums with no new original material in two years is mighty suspicious. I'm just saying.

Last year's Music for Courage & Confidence was a diverting foray into the oft dodgy realm of covers by our man Eitzel, but it wasn't terribly essential listening, largely because it found him putting aside his primary strength-- songwriting-- in favor of a spin through a weirdly chosen repertoire of other people's songs. I guess you could see it as something of a vacation for him, and The Ugly American, following almost exactly a year later, feels like an extension of that vacation, revisiting nine songs from his past (both solo and with the venerable American Music Club), and recasting them through the lens of Greek folk music.

It's not as singer/songwriter-goes-all-World-Music-on-our-asses as it sounds, though. The mournful character of the Greek modes and the gorgeous timbres of the traditional instruments build quite a house for Eitzel's dejected muse to live large in. The atmosphere is a huge departure from the ProTools ambience that unexpectedly marked 2001's The Invisible Man, and Eitzel sounds unusually comfortable-- his singing here may be the best he's ever done. Half of the album consists of songs from his days with American Music Club, and the reinventions they get complement the original versions nicely, for the most part. "Western Sky" and "Last Harbor"-- both from AMC's California-- rank among Eitzel's most haunting compositions, and the treatment the Greek band gives them lends them an effervescence even the original versions didn't quite possess.

Manos Ahalinotopoulos crafts a gorgeous melody on pipes for "Nightwatchman", and the buoyant drumming of Panos Tolios gives it a confident bounce; this version has a sweep and grace to it that are hard to deny, even if you swear by the original. "Take Courage"-- originally from the Eitzel solo set Songs of Love: Live a the Borderline-- is beautified by Manos Pirovolakis' Cretan lyra countermelodies, and is one of several songs that makes the case that there needs to be more mandolin on rock albums. Thoughtful violin orchestration, pensive clarinet and sympathetic drumming turn "Will You Find Me?" (from AMC's excellent Mercury) into a rich meditation where it was once stark and unrelentingly bleak.

The biggest shock, and the biggest misstep, on the album is the version of "Here They Roll Down", originally the opening track from AMC's first truly great album, United Kingdom. Where the definitive version blends with a field recording of a highway underpass and ends with an odd false crescendo, this version is full of squealing cacophony, mostly from wind instruments, while Eitzel sings the lyrics about directionless motorists almost without regard to the weirdness flailing around him. It's...strange, and while it's certainly a bold track, it doesn't fit.

The Ugly American closes with a cover of a song by producer Manolis Famellos, which, with its hook of "She crucified my ruined heart so sweetly," is perhaps a tad more melodramatic than most of Eitzel's work, but nonetheless fits the mood of the album well. For Eitzel's loyal core of fans, this is obviously required purchasing, if only for the versions of such difficult-to-find gems as "What Good Is Love?" (from a tour-only disc) and the two Songs of Love tracks ("Jenny" and "Take Courage"). The Ugly American stands well on its own, though, and certainly proves Eitzel to be a more versatile performer than he sometimes seems. For a loop in the holding pattern, it delivers much more than expected.