Early in his career,
Patrik Fitzgerald was so often compared to the better-known
John Cooper Clarke that to this day, some people think that
Fitzgerald's best-known song, the 1977 punk novelty single "Safety Pin Stuck in My Heart," was actually one of
Cooper Clarke's hits. But after he was dropped by Polydor Records following the commercial failure of 1979's Grubby Storys, and the subsequent breakup of his backing band,
Fitzgerald signed to the experimental U.K. indie Red Flame Records and made 1982's compellingly odd Gifts & Telegrams. Completely abandoning the "punk poet" delivery of his early singles in favor of either deadpan spoken word recitations or (more often) straightforward singing of somewhat uncertain pitch, and playing all the instruments (mostly synthesizers and cheap rhythm boxes) himself,
Fitzgerald reinvents himself on Gifts & Telegrams. A dour, depressive post-punk record somewhere between the D.I.Y. minimalism of synth pop pioneers like the pre-fame
Human League and the artsy gloom of the Factory Records brigade, Gifts & Telegrams is so insular as to be impenetrable lyrically, and the deadpan cover of
Jacques Brel's "My Death" ties into
Fitzgerald's early attempts to be signed by
David Bowie's first manager, Ken Pitts: there's a strange but undeniable similarity in
Fitzgerald's vocal delivery to Bowie in his earliest and most
Scott Walker-influenced incarnations. Similarly, though it's doubtful Dan Bejar has ever heard this album, fans of
Destroyer will find a definite sonic kinship in terms of style and themes, if not arrangements. Though mostly of interest to post-punk genre historians and collector geeks, Gifts & Telegrams is just interesting and unique enough to be worthwhile listening. ~ Stewart Mason