The common perception of anything bracketed as electronica is that you can dance to it. But while there are beats aplenty decorating the 16 tracks of this expanded re-issue of Metronomy’s debut album, you’ll need the lithe limbs of a contortionist to fully physically engage with the arrangements on offer.
The squelchy, fuzzy thuds of opener You Could Easily Have Me come on like the mangling of a 1970s glam-rock stomper and the Dr Who sound effects department, overseen by both Kraftwerk and dawn-of-disco Frenchmen Space. It’s a calling-card number, a firm fan favourite – but its accessibility, relative to what follows, is misleading. Pip Paine’s eccentric compositions rarely sit still long enough to settle into any groove; it’s an album that frustrates as often as it rewards, its fidgety tendencies sometimes spoiling what could be addictive little numbers.
Love Song For Dog – stabs of percussion fractured by design, brass dominating the high end – is along the lines of what you imagine Four Tet producing if Kieran Hebden had the wonky beats of the Ninja Tune catalogue somehow played to him in the womb. This Could Be Beautiful (It Is) chimes delightfully but ultimately leads nowhere, Trick or Treatz dismantles Hot Chip and reassembles the constituent pieces all back to front, and Bearcan clangs with enthusiasm but seemingly little direction.
Ultimately, Pip Paine is a showcase for main man Joseph Mount’s imagination over accomplished execution – the ideas on show would be better realised on the following Nights Out album, the recipient of a great deal of critical acclaim. While enjoyably disparate of component design, this record’s lack of any coherency does rather counter the playfulness evident when the listener really focuses. Closer New Toy, for example, is little more than background hum over a standard home stereo, but through decent headphones its washes of woozily eerie keyboard become quite beguiling.
Four bonus tracks add value to this release. Best among them is Hear to Wear (a b side to the Radio Ladio single), an insistent bleep frenzy that’s half Chopsticks, half krautrock. It – like much of Metronomy’s material – is baffling, the work of outsiders banging repeatedly on the door of success but, as yet, only being rewarded with keyhole glimpses of what could be.
Presumably because, try as you might, dancing to this stuff almost always ends in tears – both of laughter and born of a twisted ankle.
David Byrne St Vincent - The one who break your heart
All the beautiful people They did some work on your face And in that struggle for freedom Everyone looks the same (That's right)
And everybody is pregnant And everybody's in pain We're all pushing and shoving To make those human beings
Although they say you're aristocracy (That's what they say) We all deserve to wear that crown
Sing along With the one who broke your heart Sing it loud It'll keep you safe and warm (That's right)
In the garden of Eden On a hot summer day We were totally naked Outside that small cafe
Am I the one you imagined Am I heaven or hell But no one else can compare to The way you love yourself (You know you do)
I came to tell you on this bicycle The trees and houses say hello
Sing along With the one who broke your heart Sing it loud It will keep you safe and warm (That's right) After you dream In the middle of the night (I guess I did) I sing along To open up those spirit eyes
Faster and faster No one's holding the wheel Interstate highway Through those city and fields Your friends and family They tell your secrets to me It's not so impressive Until they all disappear
Sing along With the one who broke your heart (You know you'll do it) After that dream Where you got that man you love
It's not surprising that David Byrne and St. Vincent's Annie Clark were drawn to work together. While they're hardly sound-alikes, they are both keen but somewhat detached observers of the human condition who make music that's equally cerebral and passionate. However, it is somewhat surprising to learn that they created their collaboration Love This Giant largely online, meeting in the studio together with their team of musicians and producers a handful of times during the album's three-year gestation period, because they're on such a harmonious wavelength throughout it. Though the album's brass-driven sound suggests Byrne's post-Talking Heads work more than St. Vincent's guitar acrobatics (Clarkfans may be disappointed that her playing is relegated to the sidelines here, albeit artfully so), it was actually Clark's idea to write these songs for a brass band when the project began as a handful of songs the duo was going to perform in a bookstore. At any rate, trying to dissect the collaboration's inner workings is beside the point when the whole is this dazzlingly creative. While Love This Giant might not be a true concept album, Byrne and Clark explore the themes of individuality, community, love, and death with a thoroughness and cohesiveness that suggests otherwise, and together they push each other into creative spaces they might not have explored on their own. Clark takes a funky turn on "Weekend in the Dust," where her singing mirrors the angular brass stabs behind her as beats whirr and tick like wind-up toys, and delivers some of her most vulnerable vocals on the expansive "Optimist," one of the most unabashed love songs to New York's potential since "Empire State of Mind." However, it's Byrne who sounds most revitalized by all the creativity flowing through Love This Giant, whether on the jaunty album opener "Who," the whimsical character study "I Am an Ape," or the celebratory "The One Who Broke Your Heart," which drafts the Dap-Kings and Antibalas to help him and Clark dance on their troubles. The album peaks with back-to-back highlights from the duo: "The Forest Awakes" lets Clarkunleash her formidable fretwork over a relentlessly marching beat and strings and woodwinds, suggesting a particularly audacious St. Vincent track, while "I Should Watch TV" sets classic Byrneobservations ("How are you?"/"Not like me") to alternately jarring and jubilant brass. For all the braininess and wildness on display, there's also a sweetness to the album, particularly on "Outside of Space and Time," which sings the praises of physics-defying devotion. Given all the things Byrne and Clark pack into Love This Giant, it's a remarkably catchy and concise set of songs featuring some of the most vibrant work that either one of them has produced. Tune the album here
It could be the day that all our dreams come true.
For me and you.
Terrified me enough, just another day.
Ahh, you’re too terrified to try your best.
Just to end up with an educated guess, not success.
Like those times you wake up mystified.
Oh it feels so real in my sleep, never felt so good, so close I do with you.
Until the day this could be feeling, do you realise that I could feel it.
Everything is changing and there’s nothing I can do.
My love is turning pages while I am just sitting here.
Well, am I’m getting closer? Will I ever get there? Does it even matter?
Do I really need it? Wish that I’d remember and I’m on the outcome.
(This could be the day that we push through).
Did I really want it? Does it really matter? It was only yesterday….
(It could be the day that all our dreams come true).
Didn’t even know you… Now I’m going to miss you.
(Oh it feels so real in my sleep, never felt so good, so close I do).
Nothing ever changes, no matter how long you do your game.
It's the same to everyone else.
Everything is changing, I guess I should want my love.
But she’d just be excited
I couldn't resist the temptation to post a second tune:
It feels like I only go backwards, baby Every part of me says go ahead I got my hopes up again, oh no, not again Feels like we only go backwards, darling.
I know that you think you sound silly when you call my name But I hear it inside my head all day When I realize I'm just holding on to the hope that maybe your feelings don't show
It feels like I only go backwards, baby Every part of me says go ahead Then I got my hopes up again, oh no, not again Feels like we only go backwards darling.
The seed of all this indecision isn't me, oh no Cause I decided long ago. But that's the way it seems to go when trying, So hard to to get to something real, it feels
It feels like I only go backwards, darling Every part of me says go ahead I got my hopes up again, oh no, not again Feels like we only go backwards, darling It feels like I only go backwards, baby Every part of me says go ahead But I got my hopes up again, oh no, not again Feels like we only go backwards darling It feels like I only go backwards, baby Every part of me says go ahead But I got my hopes up again, oh no, not again Feels like we only go backwards darling.
There's a better than decent chance that, no matter where you are, Perth, Australia is pretty far away, a fact that pretty much makes Tame Impala mastermind Kevin Parker an isolated pop genius' isolated pop genius. Working mostly by himself, Parker mines this solitude with brilliant results on Tame Impala's sophomore effort, Lonerism. Diving headfirst into the realm of pop music, the way Parker uses keyboards to explore more traditional melodies makes the album feel like the McCartney to Innerspeaker's Lennon, blending the familiar with the far out to craft a Revolver-esque psych-pop experience. This shift from the guitar-heavy sound of the debut to a more synthed-out approach gives the album a more expansive feeling, allowing Parker to explore new textures through layer after layer of melody. As withInnerspeaker, sonic architect Dave Fridmann handles the mixing, and though he wasn't involved in the recording process, Lonerism definitely shares the producer's knack for using the space as an instrument in and of itself. This layering of not just sounds, but environments, creates a serene and lonely patchwork of sound, texture, and atmosphere that's a pleasure to explore, offering something different with every journey into its swirling haze of classic pop melody and modern, more experimental, construction. Most importantly, the partnership allows Fridmann to help shape Tame Impala's wild, starry-eyed ambition into something enveloping and accessible, a trick he's performed for the Flaming Lips and Mercury Revagain and again. This combination gives Lonerism the best of both worlds, allowing it the creative freedom to emerge as one of the most impressive albums of the home-recording era while still feeling superbly refined.
It's taken me a little while to bounce back I've been falling from some thing good People say I took a little too long Oh I did, yeah, Oh baby oh
Till you came a long and you saved me, you saved me, with that good love You came a long and you saved me, you saved me, oh, with that good love
It's taken me a little while to come back I've been working on some thing good Oh, so every now and then I tend to fall back Oh lord, I've been misunderstood
Till you came along and you saved me you saved me with that good love oh yeah yeah You came around and you saved me you saved me, oh, with that good love
oh yeah, yeah
You've got it all baby I'm so addicted I, I cant help but want it more and more and more
You've got it all baby I'm so addicted I, I can't help but want it more and more and more
You saved me, oh
Till you came along and you saved me you saved me, with that good love
You came a long and you saved me you saved me, oh, with that good love oh yeah, oh yeah Till you came along and you saved me you saved me with that good love
ohh you came along and you saved me you saved me, oh, with that good love
You came a long You saved me you saved me
Review by Mark Deming
Gary Clark, Jr. has been hailed by a number of critics as "the New Hendrix," which seems to be the fate of any guitarist who combines blues and rock styles at a considerable volume (particularly if they cover "Third Stone from the Sun"). While that's a blurb that may look good in Clark's press kit, it rather misses the point; Clark isn't a visionary, game-changing artist like Hendrix, but instead he's a canny singer, songwriter, and instrumentalist who has learned from the past and present, fusing them into a style that's distinctive and exciting if not necessarily revolutionary. Warner Bros. is also pitching Blak and Bluas Clark's "groundbreaking debut album," when in fact it's just his major-label debut, with four indie releases preceding it, making the confidence and ambition of this set a bit less remarkable. But if Gary Clark, Jr. isn't likely to change the way we look at rock & roll or rewrite the aesthetic of the electric guitar, he is one of the most interesting talents to come out of the contemporary blues scene in quite some time. On Blak and Blu, most of Clark's tunes are solidly rooted in the blues, but he's also folded in hearty servings of hard rock, funk, retro-soul, and even a dash of hip-hop, and the way he lets the flavors mix is a big part of what makes this album work so well. There's an undertow of Northern Soul on the dance-friendly opener "Ain't Messin' Round," "Travis County" is a no-frills rocker that recalls the Stonesin fifth gear, "The Life" finds Clark moving back and forth between singing and rapping in a streetwise tale of drug addiction, "Numb" recalls the punk blues attack of the Black Keys and the White Stripes in its fuzzed-out blast, and the title cut samples both Gil Scott-Heron and Albert King as Clark melds conscious themes with blues backdrops. While the typical modern-day guitar hero goes out of his way to throw his dexterity in your face at every turn, here Clark shows off a tougher and more primal style, and though his chops are certainly good, he keep his solos concise and his attack muscular throughout. And if his songwriting is a bit uneven, he has an inarguable talent with both lyrics and melodies, and he's a good-to-great singer, sounding soulful and honest on every cut. Blak and Blu's production (by Rob Cavallo andMike Elizondo in collaboration with Clark) is too polished and processed for its own good, but if this album isn't likely to change your life, it will make an hour of it a lot more interesting, and there's no arguing that Gary Clark, Jr. is a talent strong enough to match his record company's hype. tune the album here
It was an October morning Near the carousel. I met a light young beauty, And we talked there for a spell.
We walked up by the green lawn, And my heart began to sing. Mad man on a bench screams out, “Hold on to that slinky thing, Hold on to that slinky thing.”
Went to a party. Everybody stood around, Thinking, “Hey, what’s she doing With a burned out hippie clown?”
Young dudes were grinning, I can’t say it didn’t sting. Some punk said, “Pops, you better Hold on to that slinky thing, Hold on to that slinky thing.”
More light, more light, more light, more light, more light, more light. More light, more light, more light, more light, more light, more light.
Today we were strolling By the reptile cage. I’m thinking, “Does she need somebody Who’s closer to her own age?”
Try not to worry What tomorrow may bring. I’m just going to do my best to Hold on to that slinky thing, Hold on to that slinky thing.
More light, more light, more light, more light, more light, more light. More light, more light, more light, more light, more light, more light.
Today we were strolling By the reptile cage. I’m thinking, “Does she need somebody Who’s closer to her own age?”
Try not to worry What tomorrow may bring. I’m just going to do my best to Hold on to that slinky thing.
(Repeat and fade) She smiled, There’s a sun in my sky. She laughed, That’s my power supply. She stayed with me, I know heaven is right here on earth.
Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Morph the Cat wrapped up an alleged trilogy in 2006 -- a trilogy that only became apparent whenDonald Fagen's three solo albums were boxed in a set called The Nightfly Trilogy in 2007 -- and Fagenthen busied himself with live performances, something he avoided at the peak of his popularity in the '70s and '80s. With Walter Becker, he took several classic Steely Dan albums on tour, he became a frequent fixture at Levon Helm's Midnight Rambles, and, in 2010, he became the ringleader of the Dukes of September, a superstar blue-eyed soul revue featuring Michael McDonald and Boz Scaggs. All this high-octane rhythm can be heard on Sunken Condos, Fagen's 2012 album and easily the liveliest solo album he's released since The Nightfly in 1982. Much of that is due to a pronounced emphasis on rhythm. Sunken Condos doesn't ease on its groove, the way the otherwise excellent Morph the Cat did.Sunken Condos crackles with energy even when things are smooth; witness how "Memorabilia" and "Weather in My Head," jazzy funk numbers both, never succumb to lite comfortable grooves, as Fagenand his peerless band keep pushing at the contours of their rhythms, letting the music breathe. And that addition of space is a marked difference from much of Fagen's work since Gaucho, when he began to place an emphasis on precision over feel. Certainly, Sunken Condos boasts an immaculate production and there is not a note out of place but it is unmistakably a feel album, one where it's a pleasure to hear the band play and to hear Fagen play with his delivery, sculpting his phrases with an impish glee. ThatSunken Condos also contains his sharpest songwriting in a long time -- whether they percolate like "I'm Not the Same Without You" or sweetly sigh like "Miss Marlene," the tunes are immediate the way the songs on Steely Dan's 2000 comeback, Two Against Nature, were -- is no coincidence. Long a master of obfuscation, Fagen plays it straight on Sunken Condos, tightening his songwriting and letting his music swing, and the results are an absolute joy.
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The common perception of anything bracketed as electronica is that you can dance to it. But while there are beats aplenty decorating the 16 tracks of this expanded re-issue of Metronomy’s debut album, you’ll need the lithe limbs of a contortionist to fully physically engage with the arrangements on offer.
