Like Spinning Plates: 5 Songs With Reverse Tape Effects
This week's songs are from Toro y Moi, King Crimson, J. Cole, Wilco, and the Chemical Brothers ft. Noel Gallagher
In Memoriam: David Johansen
“right?’ And we were like, ‘it’s rock ‘n roll music; whaddya think it is?'…Little Richard, and the girl groups, and the soul bands, and…put it all together.”
The New York Dolls - “Subway Train”
In line with this week’s theme, I learned of David Johansen in a backwards way. I knew of him as the cantankerous, smoky cab driver in Scrooged from a fairly young age. Then in middle school I was watching an old rerun of Saturday Night Live with Dexter Poindexter, Johansen’s lounge act alter ego, performing “Hot, Hot, Hot” and thought “It’s THAT guy?!” Cut to high school where I’m working my way backwards through the history of punk and come to the New York Dolls. Pre-YouTube, Pre-Wikipedia, I pretty much kept to the music. It was probably a few more years before I saw a clip in some rock documentary that I had that same experience, with the same guy, for a second time. Yeah, it was that same guy again. That’s an experience you can only really have with a true original; someone following an idea rather than a path laid out for them.
The New York Dolls’ eponymous first album is one of those where you can hear both the prior 20 and next 35 years of rock and roll in one spin. Chuck Berry, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, T. Rex, The Ramones, The Sex Pistols, Thin Lizzy, Aerosmith, Dead Boys, Dead Kennedys, the Replacements, Mötley Crüe, Guns ‘N Roses, the Strokes, the White Stripes—it's all in there. Johansen passed away Friday. RIP.
The Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows” is the last song on Revolver, but the first song recorded in the sessions for the album. On April 6 & 7, 1966 the band worked with George Martin layered an organ, sitar, tambourine, and 5 tape loops over drums and bass. And then in comes the reversed guitar to create a sonic acid trip to match the lyrics John adapted from Timothy Leary. The Beatles would go on to use the technique in “Rain.” But “Tomorrow Never Knows” marked the first time a reverse tape effect was used in popular music.
Since then, reverse effects have gone on to inform everything from avant garde and electronic music, to hip hop and the “Satanic Panic” of the 1980s, when a bunch of “concerned citizens” thought rock musicians were sneaking subliminal messages onto their records that were revealed when played backwards.
Reverse tape effects can be applied with subtlety and work best when it’s woven into the fabric of the record. Aerosmith incorporated a backwards effect among a host of others, in “Sweet Emotion.” Queen used it in “Another One Bites the Dust” where you might not even notice it, building a rising tension before kicking the verse into gear. In the late 80s, The Stone Roses went for maximum effect, getting more mileage out of their song “Waterfall” by reversing it into the subsequent track “Don’t Stop.” It doesn’t work.
The prevalence of sampling in the 80s and 90s upped the possibilities of reversing loops to create new sounds, especially for hip hop. A great example would be “Paul Revere” by the Beastie Boys, which turns a basic beat from an 808 drum machine on its head. “Drop” by the Pharcyde (which samples the Beastie Boys, among others) reversed samples, and took it a step further by filming the whole video in reverse with Spike Jonze. But there is no discussion of reversed tape effects without mention of two iconic songs: Missy Elliot’s “Work It” and Outkast’s “Ms. Jackson” (and later on, “Vibrate”). Elliot’s “Work It” is a fun card trick, much like the Pharcyde’s video, but “Miss Jackson” shares a bit of the minimalism of “Paul Revere,” but tells a much different story.
In more modern approaches, back-masking is an occasional tool utilized by studio-forward, exploratory art-rock acts like Radiohead and Animal Collective. They incorporate tape loops and reversed instruments to warp time, distort, discomfort, and disorient the listener. Subtle or not, it can perk up the ears and draw our attention by forging the unfamiliar out of the familiar.
Here are 5 songs with reverse tape effects.
Toro y Moi - “Deja Vu”
Chaz “Bear” Bundick aka Toro y Moi is a multi-hyphenate musician and graphic artist, who jumps across genres. Taking the inspiration for his 2022 album Mahal, he leaned heavy into none other than the Beatles. It’s right here in the distorted reverse guitar sounds that drift across “Deja Vu,” which otherwise doesn’t sound much like the Beatles. It’s got a funky, melodic bass line and shuffling drums but somehow stays on the mellow side. What’s also striking is how up-front his vocals sound. There’s no separation from the mic, so he’s right there with you. I’m doing my best not to say “vibes” so much, but that’s really what Toro y Moi has to offer, and Mahal especially. Bundick point blank said it’s music to have on when you cook dinner, or when you’re driving around. So yeah, when you need “vibes,” he’s got you.
“I like the idea that Robert [Fripp] has mentioned before: you offer a piece of candy to the audience, and when they start to take it, you punch them in the face” - Adrian Belew
King Crimson - “Walking On Air”
“Walking on Air” does not sound anything like what comes to mind when someone says “King Crimson.” It’s the aforementioned “candy” Belew describes above. The song is on “THRAK,” the only album released by the third iteration of King Crimson - the “double trio” of Robert Fripp, Adrian Belew, Tony Levin, Trey Gunn, Bill Bruford, and Pat Mastelotto. While credited to all six, this song is a showcase for those first three names— the core trio of King Crimson’s second act. If that humid, atmospheric fog running across the track makes you think of Peter Gabriel, you shouldn’t be surprised that Levin is Gabriel’s longtime bassist. The THRAK album was recorded at Gabriel’s Real World Studios. The production gives a lot of space for Adrian Belew’s melodramatic, somewhat sultry vocal performance and winding guitar lines. Fripp weaves a gentle, reverse-delay guitar over the top of it all. It levitates in a mildly disorienting, but very compelling way. You can listen to it on repeat and hear new things each time. It’s a song that—regardless of whatever Belew is singing about—delivers on its title.
J. Cole - “Neighbors”
According to Cole, the song was about a real incident when he moved out to the suburbs to have a house with a studio. He was looking to stay unassuming.
In the driveway, there’s no rapper cars
Just some shit to get back and forth
One day a SWAT team swarmed the house based on a call from the neighbors assuming he was a drug dealer. In the song, Cole is able to wrap the incident in the bigger issues in play, rather than settle a score with the cops. In addition to a very funny tag at the end of the chorus, what stands out on the track is an elongated reverse effect in the beat that may just be a few blips and bloops on a drum machine thrown through a cascade of effects. Whatever it is, it’s got me leaning in and listening closely.
“The album has nothing to do with Star Wars. It just makes me feel good. It makes me feel limitless and like there's still possibilities and still surprise in the world, you know?” - Jeff Tweedy
Wilco - “Where Do I Begin?”
In 2015, Wilco surprise-announced they not only had a new album (Star Wars), but were giving it away for free as a gift to fans. It was mostly stuff from the same sessions, but they weren’t going to include them on their next official release in 2016 (Schmilco). Both of those followed Tweedy’s solo album Sukirae, which he made with his son Spencer, in part to have something positive for them to work on while his wife battled (and beat) cancer. That last bit of background is what informs the real power of this song. Nearly every line is heartbreaking, particularly when you read into the double meanings.
What was we
Where we meets you
From where we end
To where do I begin
It’s easy to assume the song is an elegy, with just guitar and vocals to frame the singer following what he’s singing about—he’s alone. Then comes a quick shuffle on the drums and a wall of guitars kick in on a single sustained note that gives me watery eyes every time. As the guitars wail on the same three notes like Bill & Ted at the end of Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey, the drums patter and splash in reverse. It’s both disorienting and incredibly beautiful. That first elongated note from the wall of guitars hits hard every time, right in the feels. The music reinforces the singer’s unstated desire to rewind, to experience it all from the beginning in order to savor the good parts and better prepare for the bad.
“They should’ve had me playing the drums, ‘cuz there’s a geezer playing the drums in it who’s just some—he’s a fucking plant pot, d’ya know what I mean? I coulda done that.” - Noel Gallagher
The Chemical Brothers ft. Noel Gallagher - “Let Forever Be”
I am, by nature, pretty skeptical of electronic music. There needs to be something human to what I’m listening to. Regardless of genre, I need to be able to see the fingerprints, or sense the person behind the sound to really connect with it. That’s harder to do with electronic music, but there are enough that clear this threshold for me to not dismiss entire genres that rely upon turn tables, drum machines, samplers, synthesizers, and whatever that box of knobs DJs busy themselves with. I don’t know why or when I got skeptical, because I liked a lot of electronic music in the 90s.
The Chemical Brothers had a number of propulsive and chaotic songs on rock radio playlists back then. “Let Forever Be” is the one that’s always stuck with me. There’s the reversed loop of strings, stuttering drums, and nimble bass line that collide into a beautiful mess. But the highlight here is the vocal track from Oasis’ Noel Gallagher, who never gets as much credit for his voice as he should (but, for obvious reasons). The vocal melody stretches and collapses in a nod to retro psychedelia, but unlike the singers from that time trying to sound profound and godlike, Gallagher sounds like he’s having a really good time. As for that trace of psychedelia, it’s baked into the song by those reversed strings looping throughout. Turns out, it’s a sample from the orchestral overdubs from the “Strawberry Fields Forever” sessions, looped in reverse.
And here we are at the end, right back where we started—with the Beatles.
Thanks for reading. Enjoy listening.
Full playlists of songs featured in 5 Songs: