Review
Genre and Mood
Mount Sims’ Black Sunglasses is electroclash from the American edition of UltraSex, filed by Discogs under electro and synth-pop, and dark and intense in the one review we found that names it. Exclaim!’s Rob Bolton picked it, with If I Can’t Have You, as one of “the dark and intense tracks” that “work really well, combining the old-school electronics with modern techno layers”.
Song Summary
That sentence is nearly all the description of Black Sunglasses we found, so this page stays close to it. The album around it is, in Bolton’s words, “a rather atypical blend of simplistic early ’80s electro programming with absurd lyrical subject matter delivered deadpan by Sims”. Black Sunglasses runs 4:51 and is the twelfth of thirteen tracks on Emperor Norton’s US CD, just before Good Service; it is not on the European edition. Discogs credits Mount Sims with writing, performing, producing and arranging it, and Mickey Petralia with the mix.
Musical Breakdown
No source describes the track’s sections, lyric or timings, so this breakdown follows only what the review names.
The Old-School Electronics
Bolton hears early-1980s electro in the album’s programming, and here the “old-school electronics” are the base.
The Techno Layers
On top come “modern techno layers”: listen for what belongs to the clubs of 2002 rather than to 1982.
The Mood
Dark and intense, said Bolton, one of the tracks that “work really well”.
Concepts in Focus
electroclash revived the electro, synth-pop and new wave of the 1980s around 2000, with deadpan vocals and a taste for performance; UltraSex came out in Europe on International DeeJay Gigolo Records, the Munich label the scene grew around. Black Sunglasses is a compact example of what Exclaim heard in it: the electronics of the past and the techno of its own day in one track. Compare it with another song from the same CD, Mount Sims – Together Alone.
mixing is where those layers meet. Mount Sims wrote, played, produced and arranged UltraSex himself, but Mickey Petralia mixed every track except Delicious & Nutritious. The mix decides how the old sounds and the new sit against one another in the finished track.
Artistic Context
Mount Sims is Matthew Sims, an American DJ, performance artist and producer from Milwaukee, later based in Berlin, formerly of the alternative rock band Citizen King. UltraSex, his debut, came out in 2002 on International DeeJay Gigolo Records in Europe and Emperor Norton Records in the United States, with different track lists; Wikipedia calls it a concept album about technology and sexuality, influenced by German and British new wave, funk and electronica. On stage, Exclaim noted, he was joined by two “erotic modern dancers”, Lisa and Erin.
Impact and Reception
Reviews of the album were mixed: AllMusic’s Bradley Torreano praised “a throbbing, sensual slab of neo-electro”, Rolling Stone’s Christian Hoard found its dark, minor-key melodies sounded “like afterthoughts”, and Bolton concluded that the music was better appreciated live, the disc “just a bit flat”. Yet he singled out Black Sunglasses as one of the tracks that work. It is here as the darker side of a record full of deadpan absurdity. Listen after dark.
