1. Coming Up
2. Trails
3. My Baby
4. Perfectly Crystal
5. In My Head
6. Leave The Drummer Out There
7. Sighs
8. Deep Weird Sleep
9. Counterglow
10. Ocean
11. Trance Out
12. Pink Light
Asobi Seksu has announced the release of their fourth album, Fluorescence,
on Polyvinyl Records, which promises to be a bold, “coiled-up cobra” of
sorts. It will be available February 14th in UK/Europe and 15th in
North America on CD as well as a limited edition, pink vinyl LP with
gatefold jacket, as well as the usual digital formats. The album
features the lead single, “Trails”, which is available now as an MP3 download.
If the artwork recalls early 4AD releases to you, you’re not mistaken
since it features work from designer Vaughan Oliver, known for his
Cocteau Twins and Pixies artwork. The album is available for pre-order
now on the Polyvinyl website. Divine voice of Yuki Chikudate will touch everyone's heart!
Ethereal melancholia: sluggish anti-speed delirium, warped in a
baritone, empyrean wonderland of instrumental, Scandinavian simplicity.
That is Danish-band ‘Chimes & Bells’: a twisted liquorish all-sort of ‘Flashy Python’ meets ‘The XX’,
where even the euphemisms dark-chocolate or espresso-black pale in
comparison to its pessimistic undercurrent of complete and utter
darkness. ‘Interpol’, eat your heart out.
With my insatiable hankering for something bluesy surprisingly satisfied, I return to Highly Evolved
after nearly a month of soul-searching midst assignments with an album I
just can’t seem to put down. Their official, self-titled debut emerges
after their critically acclaimed EP, “Into Pieces Of Wood”, successfully released ‘09 to ever-growing recognition and positive-reception. Debut-comparisons are the likes of ‘Tame Impala’ (“Innerspeaker“), with a refined calibre of uncategorical style and technique. While the overused tag of indie fails to encompass even the slightest margin of ‘Chimes & Bells’, it is similarly rash to singularly suggest either alternative, rock or even post-rock
in its place. For at times, it will be all of these things, and then
none of these things; a mixture of conflicting acoustical/electrical
instrumentation – guitar, percussion, synth, saxophone and string are
only the beginning. To listen is to shoegaze: drift across the
room as a ghostly astral projection pinned helplessly against the wall.
Those optimists still teddy-hugging their pillows to sleep best turn
away, for ‘Chimes & Bells’ is anything but happy…
Cæcilie Trier, twenty-six-year-old Danish multi-instrumentalist, is the architect behind ‘Chimes & Bells’, previously a part of such bands as ‘Le Fiasko’ and ‘Choir Of Young Believers’. Spearheading vocals, Trier is like an antimatter Florence Welsh from “Florence + The Machine”. A ten-piece band in all, consisting of: Hans
Emil Hansen, Jeppe Brix Sørensen, Silas Tinglef Hageman, Jannis Noya
Makrigiannis, Jaleh Negari, Jakob Falgren, Jeppe Skjold, Sonja LaBianca and Maja Zander.
Just shy of the forty-minute mark, “Chimes & Bells” is
teasingly short, but nevertheless enjoyable – without distasteful
fillers. Instead, a rather filling eight-track listing averaging around
four- to six-minutes each. Whether it’s the minimalistic approach
towards instrumental-coupling, guitar and saxophone, percussion and
guitar, or simply Trier herself with everything else conspiring together in unity, nothing seems overdone, outdrawn or oversimplified.
The tracks resemble melodramatic sludge, oozing and ebbing with tidal
angst and malevolent undertones; where pace seems underdog to
gargantuan displays of exhaustive lethargy. The dominance of Trier
on vocals, in tandem with an almost unyielding combination of
guitar-percussion duets, manifest throughout the album in one form or
another. Lyrically, words are predominantly distorted in a thick haze
of synth, while vocals are resonantly-airy. Its bluesy-jazzy atmosphere
reeks of solitude, of late-night wanderings through the underground, a
manifesto of the shadow. While their unique flavour remains unvarying
within each song – enough to allow a casual bleed from one track to the
next seamlessly – it is not enough to impact on their individuality. And
being characteristically monotone in effect, crescendos are rounded to
the consistency of a dull roar.
“The Mole” opens for “Chimes & Bells” with a relatively hushed beginning, reduced to the skeletal bonds between Trier,
the solo hum of an impending synth-scape and the occasional sound of
glass bells tolling. The introduction of string conforms the urgency
within the vocals into an understated crescendo where everything else
just sort of tumbles into place at 1:52. The electro-acoustical
harmonies flow effortlessly together, bleeding out and into “Reasons”, where the ethnic, Asian-qualities of a mandolin help to offset Trier in a sort of role-reversing lead. When drum-kit percussion appears at 2:02, the track peaks slightly – and like “The Mole”, everything just eases into place without much need for an explosion. Then this couplet ends, dying away in place of “The Dot” which starts this elegant process all over again.
Tracks like “This Far” and “Do The Right” feature dominating guitar riffs in a simplistic style akin to ‘Interpol’
– their integrity is held together through tidy riffs altering scale
but not form. Solos are in turn sacrificed for this repetitive order,
and instead act like keynotes or signifiers for ease of recognisability.
This same attribute is then turned on its head, following the end of “Do The Right” where saxophones play off one another leading up to “Pool”, where the guitar dominates in a particularly beautiful solo, descending through an effortless string of notes.
“Lashes”, finale for “Chimes & Bells”, is similarly timid and withdrawn in nature. Trier
features more explicitly, surrounded less-so by her instruments during
speech than previous, which are left to reinforce her breaks. Its
miniature crescendos are really the only place where they combine more
avidly. But it isn’t enough to look at this track as an ending for “Chimes & Bells” – because of its tracks’ (overall) well-rounded construction – any one of them could be a beginning, and just the same, an end.
What frightens me the most is that this astoundingly brilliant debut
had the potential to slip through my fingers unnoticed; I just happened
to stumble upon it by accident. And while I wish there was more that “Chimes & Bells”
could offer, I write this review wholeheartedly satisfied because of
its rewarding impact. I cannot underline its faults, but I think I’ve
boot-licked it enough. It is simply epic…
01 - Golden Haze
02 - Quiet Hours
03 - Take Me In
04 - Your Rabbit Feet
05 - Asleep
06 - Vultures Like Lovers
AWESOME ~ HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Whether digging through the crates at a used CD store, or
plumbing the depths of Amazon, one of the great thrills of being a music
fan is discovering a certain style that appeals to you, and seeing just
how deeply you can immerse yourself in it before coming up for air. Gemini felt
like Jack Tatum was sharing that feeling with all of us-- that first
experience with a Smiths or Cocteau Twins album when you wonder, "Where
has this been all of my life?" That he made his album stand out amidst a
formidable number of similar acts was a testament to how well he could
extract one recognizable cell from the past and spawn it into something
wholly his own, reverential but hardly derivative. Golden Haze initially appears to be the culmination of Wild Nothing's big year, collecting the previously available Evertide EP, a Gemini
B-side, and two new tracks. But as a State of Wild Nothing Report, it
shows that Tatum is nowhere near done messing with his favorite musical
ingredients. While still enamored with 1980s UK indie, like so much of Gemini,
the maneuvering here sneaks up on you. The sunny jungle of "Summer
Holiday" is almost completely forgone for something sleeker and darker,
more along the lines of Gemini standouts "Chinatown" or "Bored Games".
It's a good look for him, considering Tatum's knack for succinct
romantic pleas ("beautiful one, I want to go where you are") and weaving
chains of floral guitar notes, both of which propel the gorgeous title
track. It's one of Wild Nothing's strongest singles, but it's also where
he starts to tweak the arrangements, particularly with drums. The
textural mesh of its severely-gated snare and sleigh bells recalls the
Cure's "Just Like Heaven", and Tatum's portentous and maudlin vocal
range invites further comparisons to Robert Smith.
Oddly enough, the one selection from Golden Haze EP that would've been the most jarring inclusion on Gemini is
actually a B-side from "Summer Holiday"-- "Vultures Like Lovers" is
pure, ecstatic texture, a heavily processed guitar ping-ponging with
delay, and Tatum's tremolo'd vocals building a cyclone from the ground
up. It's the sort of experiment that ends up as a B-side for a reason,
but its inclusion is evidence of what I find most charming about Wild
Nothing: The combination of decades-old influence with the ability to
see a modern prolific talent progress almost in real time.
1. Blackwater 2. Party Like It's 1929 3. I Just Can't Bring Myself To Say The Words 4. Waiting For That One Clear Moment 5. ImpresjoNiste 6. My Little Friend 7. The World Is My Oyster 8. Excuse Me, Brother 9. Songs
Fifth regular studio album from 2010, featuring Morten J. Olsen as co-producer and Susanne Sundfør and Clara Uchima on guest vocals. Thomas Dybdahl is an amazing musican and masterpiece maker.
