The Burning of the Midnight Amp

Sparks bring Balls to a close with “The Angels,” the album’s third single—and one of its more unusual stylistic detours.

We discuss the song’s curious blend of balladry, electronic production and a chorus that seems to promise a bigger payoff than the verses ever quite deliver. The lyrics offer a classic Sparks image: angels disappearing because someone simply looks too damn cool. Musically, though, the panel is far less convinced, with the track landing near the bottom of the album for most of us.

We also compare the album version with the alternate Sparks mix and the Tony Visconti remix, consider whether Balls would have worked better ending with “Irreplaceable” or even “The Calm Before the Opera,” and look back at the album as a whole.

Balls may be one of the less celebrated Sparks albums, but it still contains several real highlights—and more importantly, it marks the end of one musical phase before Ron and Russell tore up the rulebook again and moved towards Lil’ Beethoven.

Sparks head back into the harder electronic territory of Balls with “It’s Educational,” a track built from big-beat loops, industrial textures and one particularly persistent background vocal.

We discuss the song’s late-90s Prodigy and Nine Inch Nails flavour, Russell’s mostly spoken delivery, and an arrangement that keeps building towards something without ever quite delivering the expected release. For all three of us, that makes it one of the weaker moments on the album—interesting in places, but more like an experiment or B-side than a fully realised Sparks song.

The lyrics are more intriguing, presenting human nightlife almost like a scientific field study: strange creatures observed in their social habitat, sleeping by day, living by night and taking part in elaborate mating rituals. Maybe that is where the “education” comes in.

Originally also issued as a B-side to “The Calm Before the Storm,” “It’s Educational” is one of those deep cuts where the ideas may be more interesting than the finished track itself.

Sparks slow things down with “Irreplaceable,” one of the most melodic and unexpectedly elegant tracks on Balls.

We discuss the song’s unusual combination of beautiful piano, deep bass, drum-and-bass-inspired rhythms and a sweeping melody that feels almost like Sparks attempting an early-2000s James Bond theme. Somehow, all of these elements seem like they should clash—yet they come together into one of the album’s most distinctive arrangements.

Lyrically, the song is much harder to pin down. Is the “irreplaceable” thing a person, a relationship, a possession, or something broader about a world where everything is designed to break and fail? That ambiguity becomes part of the appeal, allowing the song to move from consumerism to loss and loneliness without ever fully explaining itself.

We also discuss why this obscure deep cut was played live only once, and how its piano-led atmosphere may offer another small glimpse toward the direction Sparks would take on Lil’ Beethoven.

After a short break, and two recent Sparks concerts, we return to Balls with “It’s a Knockoff,” a song that actually predates the album by several years.

Originally written for Tsui Hark’s 1998 Jean-Claude Van Damme film Knock Off, the track was used over the end credits after Sparks had also composed much of the film’s incidental music. We discuss its deceptively simple arrangement, huge low-end bass, oddly childlike synth textures and a melody that quickly won us over.

Lyrically, the song turns the idea of counterfeit goods into something much stranger and more personal: fake voices, fake eyes, fake hands and even a potentially fake relationship. It is classic Sparks: funny, slightly surreal and built around a concept nobody else would probably have thought to turn into a pop song.

We also look at its unusual history, from being performed live before the film was even released to becoming one of the more streamed tracks on Balls, and why this relatively gentle song works so well as a change of pace after the frantic “Bullet Train.”

Sparks board the Shinkansen for “Bullet Train,” one of the fastest and most relentlessly repetitive tracks on Balls.

We discuss its breakneck electronic production, steadily accumulating layers and late-1990s action-movie energy, along with the obvious links to “Balls” and “Aeroflot.” For some of us, it is the strongest of the album’s harder electronic tracks; for others, the formula already feels overused by this point.

Beneath the celebration of speed and engineering perfection, however, Sparks insert a small relationship crisis. The bullet train may be immaculate and impeccable, but its passengers remain incapable of building a perfect relationship—and crying is apparently best saved until they get home.

We also revisit Ron Mael’s wonderfully deadpan lyric reading and ask how longtime fans reacted when Sparks returned after such a long gap with a sound so heavily rooted in contemporary big beat and electronica.

Sparks explain “How to Get Your Ass Kicked” with a song that sounds nothing like its title suggests.

Instead of an aggressive electronic assault, we get one of the gentlest and most melancholy tracks on Balls. We discuss the warm synths, simple drum loop and understated melody that create an unexpectedly comforting atmosphere around a protagonist who repeatedly provokes the wrong people and never seems capable of learning from the consequences.

The contrast is pure Sparks: a darkly comic story about an irritating, self-destructive character transformed into a strangely beautiful ballad. We also consider whether he secretly wants the punishment he keeps inviting, the song’s distant connection to “Here Comes Bob,” and why this charming deep cut was almost completely neglected in concert.

It may be one of the album’s quietest moments, but “How to Get Your Ass Kicked” is also one of its most distinctive—and the first Balls track that Chris immediately wanted to hear again.

Sparks explore the uneasy silence before everything changes on “The Calm Before the Storm,” the second single from Balls.

We discuss the song’s 1990s pop production, unusual brass touches and whether its melody is immediate enough to carry a single. More importantly, we dig into some of Ron Mael’s strongest lyrics of the period: dogs allowing the postman through, empty beaches, postponed flights and a world reduced to monotone and monochrome. Nothing is happening—and that is precisely what makes it feel so ominous.

The episode also takes in the charming animated music video, which gives the song an unexpected boost, and “The Calm Before the Opera,” a dramatic so-called anti-remix that rebuilds the bridge into an almost entirely new composition. With its repetition, orchestral weight and operatic atmosphere, this alternate version offers another striking glimpse of the direction Sparks would soon pursue on Lil’ Beethoven.

Sparks invite us aboard one of the most questionable flights in pop history with “Aeroflot.”

We discuss the track’s hard-edged electronic production, its slow build from a relatively thin opening into a much more forceful final section, and the guitar, synths and live drum fills that give the closing stretch its impact. The result feels closely related to the title track “Balls,” though several of us wonder whether the studio version needed even more punch.

Lyrically, this is classic Sparks: an apparent advertisement for Aeroflot filled with reasons to feel deeply uneasy about flying with them. Lines about having “reservations,” loving adventure and making Richard Branson jealous turn the song into a brilliantly ambiguous piece of airline promotion, while references to Eisenstein continue the Mael brothers’ fascination with cinema.

Originally released as the B-side to “More Than a Sex Machine,” “Aeroflot” became a lively concert number—including a particularly appropriate performance in Moscow—and offers a comic contrast to the far more enthusiastic celebration of travel later on “Bullet Train.”

Sparks turn to One Thousand and One Nights for “Scheherazade,” one of the most atmospheric and divisive tracks on Balls.

We discuss its slow-building hip-hop-influenced beat, dramatic strings, understated piano and Tammy Glover’s live drum fills, along with Amelia Cohn’s brief spoken contribution. For some of us, the combination creates one of the album’s most sophisticated and beautiful deep cuts; for others, the production feels too tied to the late 1990s and never quite comes together.

Lyrically, the song retells Scheherazade’s nightly struggle to remain alive by keeping the king entertained with new stories. We also consider a more self-referential interpretation: Sparks as the storyteller, continually inventing something new to hold the attention of their audience and the music industry.

Rarely performed and largely overlooked since the Balls era, “Scheherazade” may also offer an early glimpse of the orchestral direction Sparks would explore more fully on Lil’ Beethoven.

Sparks insist that there is more to them than meets the eye on “More Than a Sex Machine,” the first single from Balls.

We discuss the song’s bouncy electronic production, sticky melody and unexpected tango-like character, including the intriguing suggestion that it could almost have been sung by Grace Jones. Lyrically, the supposedly irresistible lover has grown tired of being valued only for sex and would quite like someone to notice that he reads books and has a sensitive side.

We also explore its links to earlier Sparks songs such as “Sextown U.S.A.,” “All You Ever Think About Is Sex” and “La Dolce Vita,” the German single releases and elusive club remixes, and why reviewers often identified it as one of the album’s strongest tracks.

Catchy, funny and surprisingly vulnerable, “More Than a Sex Machine” provides a smoother bridge from Gratuitous Sax & Senseless Violins into the more abrasive world of Balls.