Nits - Henk/Kilo (1986/1983 New Wave)

After the mighty leap forward that was Omsk, the Nits wasted little time in recording the mini-album Kilo, released just six months later. Again, songwriting was divided between Hofstede, Peters, and newcomer Stips, and again Hofstede established himself as an inspired melodist with the dramatically orchestrated "Sketches of Spain" and the wryly nostalgic "Dapper Street" -- a remarkably beautiful song that would now surely be acknowledged as a classic if only it had had the name Elvis Costello attached to it. Unlike Omsk, however, this time the contributions of Peters and Stips measure up to their leader's. Peters' "Bild Am Sonntag (As Usual)," with its tick-tock rhythm underpinning one of the band's rare forays into vocal harmony, is a dreamily ominous song about small-town boredom turning sour. Stips' "Memories Are New (III)" has a languid South American feel buoyed by nylon guitars, vibraphones, and rippling piano, and is only let down by Stips' rather colorless vocals. Oddly, though, it's Hofstede who supplies Kilo's weakest track, the closing "Your Next Tyres," which sounds like a leftover from the band's self-consciously quirky period. The band's production throughout is lush and spacious, with Stips' distinctive multi-layered keyboards providing the illusion of a much bigger band without ever lapsing into the kind of synthesized overkill that makes so many recordings from the early '80s so easy to date and hard to listen to. [Kilo was reissued on CD as a two-fer with the 1986 album Henk.]

Henk was the first album to be recorded by the Nits as a three-piece following the traumatic departure of Michiel Peters, yet it found them in an unexpectedly playful mood. From the eccentric openers "Bike in Head" and "Port of Amsterdam," it was clear that the bandmembers were once more in control of their own destiny and would have no truck with pleas to emphasize their more commercially viable songs. "Bike in Head," for instance, deploys samples of bicycle bells and includes the lyric "I just bought an elephant today," while "Port of Amsterdam" is a rambunctious drinking song in which Hofstede's voice is subjected to all manner of wacky electronic distortion. But for all its often wilful eccentricity, Henk does contain a core of enduring songs that marry the band's pop sensibility with its more experimental tendencies. On the first, "Typist of Candy," Hofstede's touching, double-tracked voice recalls the Everly Brothers, though any retro intent is canceled by a beguiling climax featuring Robert Jan Stips' fairground keyboards and what sounds like someone tap dancing on a typewriter. "Home Before Dark" is an altogether more somber affair, the album's single foray into understatement and one whose directness and simplicity foreshadow Henk's successor, In the Dutch Mountains. "Sleep (What Happens to Your Eyes)" survives a tricky synth arrangement to become one of the Nits' most persuasive blends of melody and electronica, while the irresistible "Cabins" sets Philip Glass to a four-square beat. Too much of the rest, however, is quirky in a bad way. More than once, you suspect Stips and his fancy new sampling equipment were allowed to run riot, dressing up already slender songs with eldritch noises that began to date as soon as the record hit the shops. The CD reissue is filled out with the 1983 mini-album Kilo, none of which has dated as badly as Henk.

AMG Review by Christopher Evans