At the end of an uncomfortably warm August day, the sky thickens, darkens, broods. Cumulonimbus clouds have a conspicuous familiarity about them; they roll in. Along with, hearty gusts, freeing loose leaves from obliging trees. The air is heavy, palpable, tense. At last, the clouds capitulate, and breathe a heavy sigh that rumbles along the trembling terrain. This is the sound of “Love At The End Of The World”.
But it feels like a Chemical City afterthought. The storm climaxes, and then…and then somehow you’re somewhere else for fifty minutes. Perhaps it’s telling of the trials of aging, which Roberts tries to come to grips with in Love At The End Of The World. There’s no questioning Roberts’ fervor, but his weariness is a weight he often struggles to lift, and sometimes succumbs to, especially on “Fixed To Ruin”.
“Sundance” is a return to the storm-stricken landscape ravaged on “Love At The End Of The World”, but this time around Roberts seems mired in the futility of finitude. He’s told to “fight to keep [his] world from going under,” but “even the Sundance Kid would find it hard to shoot his way out of this hole [Roberts] is in.” Though Roberts discovers that the hole is actually nonexistent on “Up Sister” (it “ain’t a song, it’s a call to arms,”). He’s “been living in the past but the past is gone,” and that insight helps Roberts escape his fruitless rumination.
Love At The End Of The World paints a picture of a conflicted man: part of him feels the storm is too strong to weather, part of him wants to roll with it, use it to his advantage. Between “Stripmall Religion” and “Sundance” Roberts tries and fails to comprehend his chaotic world. He knows things are bad, worse than bad. He may not know why, but from “Up Sister” onward he realizes: How can I live my life—knowing there are so many injustices in the world—and not fight?
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