AMG review round-up, volume XVII: the second best of 2009

carrying on down the list...

{#26} Fuck Buttons: Tarot Sport [CP concert preview]

Fuck Buttons have a way with paradox, an uncanny aptitude for smoothing over uncomfortable juxtapositions. Just check that improbably cuddly band-name, for instance (or is that just me?) On last year’s majestically visceral Street Horrrsing, the U.K. duo made borderline-abrasive swaths of droning, monotonous electronic noise feel downright warm and cozy, yet also awesomely epic. Their nifty new Tarot Sport replicates that trick and adds a few new ones too, toning down the demonic shrieks and amping up the tribal/triumphal drumming, for maximal adrenalized pummeling hypnotic techno-bliss.

{#28} Fool's Gold: Fool's Gold [+ bio]

In a similar spirit to artists like Extra Golden and NOMO, the music of L.A.'s Fool's Gold is fundamentally rooted in – not merely inspired by – international (and more specifically, African) sounds and styles, even if they essentially emerged within the context of American indie rock (for one thing, three of the band's members overlap with the more straight-ahead indie outfit Foreign Born.) This self-titled debut finds the group – a twelve-strong cohort led by bassist/vocalist Luke Top and lead guitarist Lewis Pesacov, featuring a pair of saxophonists and a full four members devoted to percussion and chant-like auxiliary vocals – delving energetically into eight spicy, polyrhythmic, highly danceable compositions whose emphasis is firmly on groove and riff, as opposed to song per se. Top's curiously resonant, commanding vocals do provide a focal point (he sings primarily in Hebrew, a significant personal distinction for the Israeli-born vocalist, but one which non-Hebrew-speaking listeners will find merely adds another subtle layer to the general ethnic ambiguity at play here), but they are interspersed throughout to give equal weight to the rest of the ensemble, and especially to Pesacov's deliciously nimble fretwork, which is central to the album's idiomatic credibility (cementing, in particular, the buoyant opener/lead single/instant standout "Surprise Hotel.") To some listeners, the stylistic accuracy and pan-ethnic eclecticism of the group's highly informed cross-cultural homages/borrowings (an Ethiopiques-styled number here, a Tuareg blues-informed one there) may come off as somewhat glib and generic, and indeed the album has a bit of the faceless feel of, say, a Putomayo: Africa compilation. But that in itself is, all things considered, an impressive feat for a motley crew of Angelenos; the fact that, far from dry mimicry, Fool's Gold offers up an abundance of joy and soul makes it both a significant statement – further testament to the limitless potential of global musical cross-pollination – and, much more importantly, a hell of a party record.

{#29} Anna Ternheim: Leaving On A Mayday

For her third album -- which would become her second U.S. full-length, following the compilation release Halfway to Fivepoints -- Swedish songbird Anna Ternheim enlisted the assistance of Björn Yttling, best known as one-third of Peter Bjorn and John but increasingly prominent in his own right via production work for Lykke Li, Shout Out Louds, Primal Scream, and others. It was a savvy move -- for one thing, the collaboration netted Ternheim a Swedish Grammy for Album of the Year -- and the results were a modest but significant step away from the accomplished but slightly faceless and overstuffed jazzy lounge-folk of her earlier work, toward an edgier, more distinctly pop direction. While hardly as gritty as Yttling's work on Lykke Li's Youth Novels, or his own band's 2009 album Living Thing, Leaving on a Mayday shares with those records an inventive sparseness -- achieved more through a spacious openness in the sound than a reduction in the number of instruments, per se -- and in particular a relative paucity of guitars in favor of, among other things, surprisingly prominent percussion. That's especially true of the album's first half, where the pulsing, stripped-down grooves are colored by majestically thick string arrangements (penned by Yttling, who also contributed his multi-instrumental talents throughout.) For all its sonic distinctiveness, though, this is still fundamentally a singer/songwriter album -- the arrangements may sometimes be more initially striking than the songs they are designed to serve, but with further listening, they emerge as well-conceived if unconventional complements to a fine slate of lyrical compositions steeped in the autumnal melancholy favored by so many Scandinavians (Ane Brun, Stina Nordenstam, Britta Persson, Sarah Assbring,etc.), with an especial tinge of romantic desperation (Ternheim sometimes seems just as distraught and unsettled by the prospect of an actual romantic connection as she is over the absence of bygone and unattained lovers.) That said, several of Mayday's finest and most striking moments are at least musically upbeat, as with gloriously harmonized choruses of the sweeping opener "What Have I Done" and especially the thundering, Fleetwood Mac-ish "Make It on My Own" (one of two Yttling co-writes, and a key track added to the album for its U.S. release.) The tail-end of the disc finds Ternheim in a folkier vein, with the simply, sweetly strummed "Summer Rain," the tense, fingerpicked "Off the Road," and the foreboding, folkloric dirge "Black Sunday Afternoon" offering a nice reminder of her stylistic breadth.

{#31} Naomi Shelton & The Gospel Queens: What Have You Done, My Brother? [AMG review]
{#36} El Perro Del Mar: Love Is Not Pop [CP Interview]

{#38} Hynotic Brass Ensemble: bio and Hynotic Brass Ensemble review

"Hypnotic" may be somewhat misleading: the word suggests something lulling and gently soothing, but the music made by this band of brothers is fiery and dynamic, anything but sleepy. While occasionally reminiscent of more established brass band traditions (Balkan, New Orleans), with a hint of soul and a dash of Afro-beat's frenzied intensity, their music is best described as jazzy instrumental funk: compositionally sophisticated, highly contrapuntal, and infused with thorny harmonics undoubtedly picked up from their father -- avant-jazz notable Kelan Phil Cohran -- but always rhythmically direct and unfailingly tight. Anchored by sturdy, simple drum parts and Tycho Cohran's supple, syncopated sousaphone basslines, the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble blow dense chord clusters, indelibly soulful unison melodies, and tuneful interlocking counterlines, with only occasional focused soloing and emphasis on accessibility and groove. The album -- their first widely released full-length, which features re-recordings of many selections from their earlier self-released CD-Rs -- is consistently strong though fairly stylistically homogenous, containing mostly upbeat, party-ready tunes with either straight-ahead funk or Afro-inflected grooves, but there are a couple of curve balls in the lush, languorous (and yes, plausibly hypnotic) "Jupiter" and the especially manic, Balkan-esque Moondog cover "Rabbit Hop" (which reappears at the end with the addition of some spacy, wobbly electronic sounds). The only notable flaw in the flow comes toward the end of "Party Started," with some crowd-hyping chants that come off as moronically fratty -- though the group shouldn't necessarily avoid vocals altogether: by contrast, the street-corner scatting that closes the slinky "Ballicki Bone" is a special highlight. As a whole, it makes for an exceedingly spirited and largely unique listening experience.

{#39} Hot Leg: Red Light Fever [AMG review]
{#41} Hess Is More: Hits [AMG review]
{#43} Jill Sobule: California Years [CP concert preview]
{#44} Kikumoto Allstars: House Music [AMG review]

{#46} Two Fingers: bio and Two Fingers review

Through the late '90s and beyond, drum'n'bass cut-up maestro Amon Tobin was widely hailed as one of electronica's most exciting and innovative artists. His popularity and critical cachet have waned somewhat since the early '00s, as his output slowed and electronic trends drifted elsewhere, but the late-decade collaborative project Two Fingers should shoot him right back to the center of attention for anybody interested in forward-thinking, urban-inflected electronic beats and pieces. Working together with U.K. producer Joe "Doubleclick" Chapman, the now-Montreal-based Tobin has crafted his most thrilling and visceral work in ages, if not his entire career, freely borrowing elements of grime, dubstep, dancehall, and Dirty South hip-hop, among other styles, to fashion a sound that, while often only tangentially connected to his earlier output, ultimately sounds like little else out there. Two Fingers interpolates jittery, junglesque beat programming, a junkyard barrage of unpredictable percussive sounds and textures, and a sly, omnivorous approach to sampling ("Straw Men" opens the album with a woozily distorted riff that sounds like a refraction of the Turtles' "Happy Together," while "Jewels and Gems" coasts atop a slew of blazing sitar licks), all combined in a whirl of dark, edgy intensity -- evoking dubstep's curious ability to sound simultaneously spacious and impenetrably dense -- with relentlessly gritty, kinetic energy. Equally crucial to the album's impact are the solid contributions of several MCs; most prominently the London-based rapper Sway, who graces seven of these twelve tracks. Mostly setting aside the waggish wordplay and somewhat mawkish tendencies of his own recent work, Sway is a revelation here, sounding thirstier than ever and imbuing his typically breakneck delivery with a markedly tougher stance, without entirely excising his wry wit. The sparser, slinkier cuts tend to be the domain of female MCs, with dancehall diva Ce'Cile adding the requisite ragga flava to the simmering "Bad Girl"; Philly's Ms. Jade turns up for some stone-faced tough talk on "Better Get That," and coyly coos over the Neptunes-style minimalism of "Doing My Job." And the pair of instrumental cuts -- the eastern-tinged "Keman Rhythm" and broodingly twitchy, blasted "Moth Rhythm" -- are menacing and compelling, easily among the album's highlights. If there's a relevant contemporary reference point for Two Fingers, it's probably the Bug's London Zoo, another broadly synthesizing opus helmed by a veteran electronic producer whose post-industrial urban soundscapes draw on a similar array of styles and make comparably vital use of guest MCs, but whereas Zoo was often oppressively, crushingly bleak, hardly a party record despite its insistent dancehall riddims, Tobin and Doubleclick (and Sway) inject enough glimmers of levity and spirited playfulness -- rhythmic, sonic, and verbal -- into their often foreboding murkiness that Two Fingers should manage to engage a wide swath of movers and listeners.

{#48} Permanent Vacation records: Selected Label Works Nº 1 review

This lavishly abundant selection -- two and a half hours over two discs -- of prime modern disco and lush Balearic house represents the cream of the first few years of output from the Munich-based Permanent Vacation label. The focus is entirely on the imprint's original offerings rather than its laudable reissue efforts. Of the 22 tracks here, half of them remixes (three are also included in their original form), the vast majority are culled from the label's 2008 12" releases, and most are appearing for the first time on CD. Simply put, this is a treasure trove, not only for DJs and collectors (who should be glad to note that the compilation is unmixed) but for listeners of any stripe whose tastes run to fluid, funky, slightly spacy disco-doused grooves. The whole affair is remarkably consistent in terms of both quality -- singling out favorites is a daunting proposition -- and sound: plenty of languid acoustic strums, free-floating synths, buzzy melodics, and the occasional bit of low-grade prog-lead pyrotechnics, with an assortment of tasty vocal turns, always tethered to cozy midtempo 4/4 cadences ranging roughly from torrid to torpid, strutting to sultry. A star-studded list of contempo-disco remixers (among them Aeroplane, Todd Terje, Holy Ghost!, Superpitcher, and Hercules & Love Affair) work their distinctive brands of magic to typically lovely effect without deviating terribly far from the prevailing vibe, while the original tracks offer plenty of their own delights, from the quirky-jerky Italo-squelch of Bostro Pesopeo's "Communquis" to the slow-building, woozily anthemic filter-disco of Good Guy Mikesh & Filburt's "Someone Told Me" to the wispy acoustic noodling and dubby phasing of Dølle Jolle's "Balearic Incarnation" (made only all the more lavish in Terje's electro-kinetic Extra Doll Mix) to the classic congas'n'piano vocal house of "Tic Toc," an exclusive cut laid down by label heads Tom Bioly and Benjy Frölich with assistance from the ever-winsome Kathy Diamond. You could fault Permanent Vacation for their lack of range, or perhaps for their excessive generosity, but taken on its terms this is one solidly classy offering, right down to the intriguing, thoughtful package design, and nigh-on impeccable.

{#49} Obi Best: Capades review
L.A. singer/songwriter Alex Lilly, Obi Best's frontwoman, also tours and records as a backing vocalist for the Bird and the Bee, whose retro-inflected sophisti-pop makes an almost too handy reference point for her own work. It's an apt one, though, both in terms of Lilly's light-spirited, keyboard-based songwriting and, especially, her jazzy, mellifluent, and playfully nuanced voice, which is uncannily reminiscent of Inara George. But she's got her own distinctive style to offer as well, an infectious, wide-eyed freshness particularly evident in her curious approach to writing melodies. Fluid but quirky, swooping and sauntering with conspicuous pleasure through unexpected intervals and off-kilter rhythms, her melodic lines sometimes take on an otherworldly, vaguely oriental cast, as on "Origami" (fittingly enough) and the bouncy, carnivalesque "Swedish Boy" (perhaps more incongruously -- though the song is about "a made-up country" -- but to superbly catchy effect). The melodies mostly connect up well with Lilly's similarly ruminative, charmingly colloquial lyrics: the merger isn't always completely natural, as the words can come off clunky and half-formed (like on the somewhat perplexing rant "It's Because of People Like You"), but her beguiling voice and prevailing sweetness go a long way toward smoothing things over. Elsewhere, along with some touchingly ambivalent relationship songs, "Days of Decadence" and "Green and White Stripes" deal quite nicely with, respectively, nostalgia and ineffability. Songwriting aside, plenty of Capades' appeal lies in its playfully inventive soundscape. Lest one forget, Obi Best are, at least ostensibly, a band, comprised of L.A. studio vets (whose credits include work with Beck and Jenny Lewis) who adorn Lilly's guitar and piano stylings with all manner of fizzy, dreamlike sounds and lush, offbeat electronic effects, underscoring the warmth and whimsy that make this such a welcome, winsome debut.


{#52} Hervé: Cheap Thrills, Vol. 1 review

Beneath the suitably massive, trashy-looking, superhero-sized letters of the title -- which create the somewhat misleading if perhaps not unintentional impression of a disposable mass-market club comp -- Cheap Thrills, Vol. 1 promises to provide "The Sound of the U.K.'s Leading Dance Label: A Mix of Ghetto Bass, House, Dubstep, Electro, B-More Club and Bassline." The accuracy of the first claim may be up for debate, but there's no question that this compilation is every bit as wide-ranging, heavy-hitting, and fist-poundingly, well, thrilling as advertised. Offering no shortage of sirens, fidgety electro breaks, and gloriously corny vocal interludes, and veering wildly (sometimes within a single track) from the grittiest, rawest throbbing dubstep bass to the glossiest, unabashedly poppy stadium-trance synths with no regard for the niceties of subgenre demarcations, the only constant among these tracks -- apart from their compulsive, beats-forward danceability -- is their utter lack of restraint. It's an approach to dance music that's been sorely underexploited since the big beat heyday of the late '90s, and the lack of subtlety here is marvelously refreshing, particularly since it never comes at the expense of accessibility and tunefulness. Effectively a showcase for the imprint of the same name headed up by DJ/producer Joshua Harvey (aka Hervé, the Count, Action Man, Speaker Junk, etc., etc.), who has his hand as producer, remixer, or otherwise in nearly half of these tracks, Cheap Thrills is culled from the label's first two years (2008-2009) of output, with eight additional exclusive cuts thrown in. Only ten tracks overlap (sometimes in remixed form) between the two discs (the first is unmixed, the second a relentlessly high-energy DJ mix by Hervé -- obviously each has its place and purpose, but the mix is unquestionably the best way to experience this material), which means there are a generous 25 distinct tracks included across the 35 cuts. The quality remains impressively high throughout (though even the considerable variety may not stave off listener fatigue over two-plus hours of both discs), but definite standouts include Fake Blood's bouncy, pouncy "Fix Your Accent," Jack Beats' cannily deployed dubstep wobbles on both "U.F.O." and "Labyrinth," the pounding filter-house of His Majesty André's "Puppets," and the cartoonish "tribal" drums and incessant builds of Hervé and Jack Beats' "Rainstick."

{#56} Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs: Under The Covers, Vol. 2: The 70s [CP live review}

{#59} Etienne Jaumet: Night Music review

Despite having one album of Kraut-horror-disco (as half of the duo Zombie Zombie) and one well-received 12" (Repeat Again After Me) under his belt, Etienne Jaumet came to his debut solo full-length still a relative newcomer and a self-described outsider to the world of electronica. Perhaps that explains why it stands out as such a fresh and distinct piece of work, well removed from any obvious contemporary electronic trends. Historical reference points for the album, sonically and structurally, include early Detroit techno, the "kosmische musik" of Manuel Göttsching and Klaus Schulze, and perhaps, on a more fundamental, conceptual level, the minimalism of Steve Reich -- of course, these are seminal and inevitable touchstones for all electronic music, certainly including the entire minimal techno wave of the 2000s and especially the late-decade revival of cosmic (neo-)disco and the like. But Jaumet manages to incorporate these influences in a refreshingly pure, direct way, crafting a sincere homage to oft-elided originators while avoiding the pitfalls of mere stylistic mimicry, in part, through his unusual use of organic instrumental sounds and elements of free jazz. Night Music is a significant title, appropriately evocative yet non-specific: this is unquestionably dark music, redolent in particular of urban and somewhat seedy nocturnal activity, and it would lose much of its power and cogency if exposed to sunlight.

The track names do suggest a more precise programmatic conceit of a single night's journey through sleep and dreams, but this is hardly a restful affair. As hypnotic as it is, "For Falling Asleep" -- the album's 20-minute opener, centerpiece, and statement of purpose -- would be nearly impossible to actually sleep to, and would seem to portend, at best, highly troubled dreams. The track, built on a constant yet constantly shifting arpeggiated analog synth figure, sometimes accompanied by hissy, wobbly beatbox percussion, glides through a gradually evolving soundscape populated by unobtrusively ominous synth pads, eerie wordless female voices, and a haze of noodly saxophones -- only giving way in its final minutes to a curious, beatless liminal space where, of all things, a deftly plucked harp crops up, coexisting somewhat queasily with still-menacing synth swells. It's a small moment of repose after an exhausting but majestic journey of seemingly endless unfolding, but it's a necessary palate-cleanser, because from there we plunge directly into "Mental Vortex," which rides a sturdier, robotic Detroit groove and a taut, entrancing four-note synth riff into progressively squelchier territory. The album grows marginally calmer, if not necessarily gentler, as it proceeds -- the briefer "Entropy" once again features an insistent synth bass ostinato, but it's more spacious, almost funky, while "Through the Strata," a disquieting drone-based piece dominated by the unexpected and not entirely harmonious sound of a hurdy-gurdy, is propelled only by an intermittent kick drum pulse. Finally, "At the Crack of Dawn" is beatless but throbbing, a study in vague but unremitting tension generated primarily by a clutch of dense, sleazy saxes. It's striking stuff -- definitely not easy listening, but well worth the effort, even if it feels like a slightly lopsided affair, with the final four tracks overshadowed by one terrifically effective and truly inventive epic.

{#62} Here We Go Magic [CP concert preview]

Part breakout debut, part third-times-the-charm rebranding for indie-folkster Luke Temple, Here We Go Magic (Western Vinyl) swirls a kinda-'90s lo-fi approach with a whole host of late-'00s hipster-hippie tropes: hazy electronics, ethnic-y polyrhythms, submerged platitudinous chants and sunny Afro-pop guitar lines, along with a generous side helping of blank drone.

{#63} Nosaj Thing: Drift [AMG review]

AMG review round-up, volume X: smalltown vacation edition, or, balearic ballywho

i spent a good portion of last year continuing to track down various strains of so-called "cosmic disco" (some of which is documented in this installment), along with the related electronic sub-genre of balearic, a hazy but buzzy style which is on the mellower, less actually-danceable end of the same continuum. these records don't necessarily all fit into those categories, but they're mostly somewhere in that vicinity. the first five are on the rather stylish norwegian label smalltown supersound (also home to dominique leone and diskjokke whom i covered here), though the first several of those are slightly older releases that are more IDM/abstract than disco/psychy. the first four are norwegian artists, the next three san franciscan and incestuous, studio are swedish, and the last two are comps on the very like-minded permanent vacation label, which is based in germany.

Toy: bio and Toy review

Rarely has a band been so well named as Bergen, Norway's delightful Toy, but take note, children: the sparkling playthings heard on the group's eponymous debut offering are no mere gaudy baubles, but rather are intricately handcrafted future-retro gizmos and whiz-bang gadgets of the finest quality. Though they share a similar wistful sweetness and winsome naïveté with gentler electronic regressionists like Plone and ISAN, Toy pack a good deal more wallop into their tunes, stuffing these 44 minutes with a dizzying range of musical ideas, merry melodies, and goofy sounds. Things start out on a particularly giddy note with "Grass Beatbox"'s whirlwind of Looney Tunes-ish xylophones and "Don't Be"'s screwball vocoder fantasia, though it's not all a madcap sugar rush; the "kid in a candy store" approach occasionally settles down for midtempo fare which is considerably mellower than your average rambunctious toddler. Throughout, the duo's arrangements balance multi-layered complexity with electro-orchestral lushness, but they never feel overly electronic -- although it certainly sounds like plenty of vintage synthesizers are involved, it's tempting to imagine their recording studio as a sort of Santa's workshop, filled with curious trinkets and cobbled-together scraps culled from rummage sales and grandparents' attics. It's not too hard to think of parallels and precursors, electronic and otherwise, for this kind of kitschy but sophisticated novelty music (Luke Vibert's work as Wagon Christ and parts of the High Llamas' Cold and Bouncy come to mind, though there are certainly more vintage referents as well, from Raymond Scott on down), but Toy have an extensive bag of tricks and a sense of delicious fun all their own, and their retro-inspired 21st century vision of Toyland is well worth exploring. Recommended for ages one to 101.

Kim Hiorthøy: bio and My Last Day review

Like many of his electronically inclined Smalltown Supersound mates, longtime label associate Kim Hiorthøy approaches his work with a decidedly offbeat sensibility and a fair amount of humor. My Last Day is Hiorthøy's first proper full-length since his 2001 debut Hei, and its prevalent quirkiness is immediately apparent in the nutty songtitles ("I Thought We Could Eat Friends") and head-scratching cover art (which is not by Hiorthøy, though he is a noted graphic artist and designer.) It's evident in the music as well, but the general effect isn't so much overtly goofy as it is curious and off-kilter in a naïve, almost accidental-seeming way. This is an album of abstract listening electronica (for want of a better term), but it's presented with none of the sense of purity, in sound and form, that the genre often entails: neither immaculate inhuman precision nor lush organic warmth, but a rough-cut bushwhack between the two; deliberately messy and faltering. With few exceptions, these pieces are primarily built around simple melodies picked out on somewhat out of tune pianos and other tarnished-sounding instruments, which are surrounded with all sorts of sonic detritus (scraps of ambient noise, found-sound percussion, stray notes from other sources, distant vocal fragments), frequently yoked to choppy, hip-hop-inflected beats, and cut and pasted into casual but careful assemblages which feel purposefully unfinished, but not incomplete. It's as though Hiorthøy is attempting -- at times successfully -- to find a relatable form of musicality which is resistant to compositional conventions (though he does occasionally fall back on stock beats and pieces), driven not by willful absurdity but blithe happenstance.

Bjørn Torske: Feil Knapp review

In the six years between his 2001 album Trøbbel and this 2007 follow-up, the Norwegian electronica scene that Bjørn Torske helped to pioneer has gone international, thanks mostly to a number of his friends and collaborators, among them Röyksopp, Lindstrøm, Prins Thomas, and Erlend Øye. Given that context, the album has the makings of a major comeback statement, but the reality of it is a good deal more down to earth; Feil Knapp is nothing more or less than ten tracks of thoroughly personable, unassuming electronica encompassing a considerable array of styles -- house, ambient, psychedelic disco, dub reggae, instrumental pop -- while maintaining a distinctly lighthearted, amiable sensibility. In less subtly charismatic hands, this degree of eclecticism could come off as glibly chameleonic, but Torske approaches each track as an opportunity for unconstrained, good-humored exploration -- and often, gentle subversive juxtaposition -- rather than rote genre exercise. Hence, the stately serenity of opener "Hemmelig Orkester," with its warm ambient tones and wash of constantly billowing synths, is slyly undermined (though not disrupted) by a meek, unceremonious harmonica; the breezy disco-funk of "Hatten Passer" finds room for bongos, spry clavinet and vibraphone noodling, and a sprightly, faintly preposterous whistled refrain, as well as a few minor explosions (nobody harmed, evidently). Torske's greatest gift here is his lightness of touch; neither his irreverence nor his reverence comes off as forced, and neither seems to exist for its own sake. Though it initially comes off as a novelty, even the album's most overtly humorous moment -- when "Spelunker" sets video game splutters and a snaky, Eastern-tinged eight-bit melody against a slow-cooking dub reggae groove -- ends up feeling surprisingly, unsurprisingly, natural.

Lindstrøm: It's A Feedelity Affair and Where You Go I Go To reviews

In this post-millennial age of anxiety about the continued relevance of the album format, Hans-Peter Lindstrøm has handily established himself as the king of neo-future-retro-disco without ever bothering to release a "proper" album of his own material. Technically speaking, Where You Go I Go Too marks the Norwegian's first full-length foray, although his zealous, literal-minded approach to the format hardly makes for a more conventional "album" than the 2006 singles comp that was his solo CD debut, It's a Feedelity Affair. Where You Go has but three tracks -- roughly 30, 10 and 15 minutes long, respectively -- which play as the movements of a single, epic, hour-long work rather than as individual pieces. While each has its own distinct set of constituent material (motivic polyrhythmic patterns, melodic riffs, arpeggiator settings), they tend to be developed in similar ways, none of which should be new to Lindstrøm's followers: constantly growing and kaleidoscoping layers of instrumental texture, lovingly teased and tweaked electronic filters and effects, unexpected and dazzling harmonic shifts, and occasionally spacy synth swooshes that come along to tear everything down, only so it can be built back up again. This is unquestionably music about exploring and relishing the process of change and mutation itself, rather than advancing any specific, tangible musical content. Even the 29-minute title piece contains only as many discernible musical ideas as your average five- to seven-minute techno track, but its luxurious length lets those ideas stretch out gloriously and (for both artist and listener) indulgently, allowing a slow, fluid evolution that gestures towards a cosmic infinity.

Arp: bio and In Light review

In Light's opener, "St. Tropez," the simplest and sparsest piece on an album notable for its simplicity and sparseness, consists entirely of a single two-note figure in a pure-sounding electric piano tone, repeated continuously while a second voice in the same timbre meanders sympathetically, soloistically around it. It firmly and economically establishes a sense of stillness and contemplative calm: not quite the warmth and contentment suggested by the piece's Mediterranean title or the album's grainy cover shot of a sunset (presumably, Arp being Californian) over the sea -- though certainly far from the opposite of those things -- but a gentle, hopeful quietude with the slight air of clinical detachment. A similar sense carries, somewhat less deterministically, throughout In Light, whose title accordingly seems to connote the figurative light of clarity and reason more than the tender, comforting light of the sun, but that doesn't mean that this is a sterile or foreboding listening experience. The gradually mutating analog textures that Alex Georgopolous has synthesized here often have an engagingly natural quality, as does his fluid, intuitive approach to composition, particularly on the indulgently expansive 16-minute "Odyssey," which was recorded in a single, unedited, improvised take. As inviting as these pieces often are -- five of them were initially conceived for an installation wherein listeners would lie in a cozy featherbed nook -- several of them do come off as subtly, unexpectedly unsettling, with vague traces of instability and unease -- barely perceptible discordant flute overtones gilding the lush piano ambience of "The Rising Sun"; woozy high-pitched warbles floating atop the lusciously buzzy "Fireflies on the Water"; and insistent, dizzyingly jaunty arpeggios underscoring the Baroque "Premonition of the Sculptor Steiner." Meanwhile, the striking "Potentialities," which appears first as a wholly synthesized piece with a steady percussive pulse, and then in a largely organic arrangement featuring a string trio and acoustic piano, has a tense, restlessly searching quality. None of this is overtly off-putting, to be sure, but it does create a slight, constant edge that belies and complicates the straightforward simplicity of Arp's minimalist premise, serving as a reminder that light can be cold and stark as well as warm and reassuring, and that neither is necessarily any less revealing, or less beautiful.

Hatchback: bio and Colors of the Sun review

Some albums sound just the way you'd imagine them. It's only natural and fitting that a record called Colors of the Sun, by an artist (from San Francisco) named Hatchback, with song titles like "Carefree Highway," "Open Valley," and "Horizon," would be warm, wistful, vibrant, hazy, summery, autumnal, and evocative of free-spirited road trips and nostalgic bliss. What's impressive about this particular album is how simply and sweetly it satisfies all of these distinct yet impressionistic expectations suggested by its nomenclature -- so aptly conveyed as to seem almost inevitable, but not nearly so readily achieved -- resulting in a gorgeous, glowing journey that is at the same time sublimely relaxed and restful. The pieces that make up these pieces (oodles of analog synths, loping drum loops, fluid streams of electronic-sounding, organic-feeling melody, guitars and pianos and horns that might be sampled or synthesized or played) fit together so seamlessly, yet in such subtly shifting combinations, that one begins to wonder whether the effortlessness they project reflects an unusually intuitive, ingenuous creative approach, or if it masks a deliberate, painstaking, no less ingenious process of integration and formulation. To be sure, Hatchback is not without an extensive range of precursors and influences. Producer/composer Samuel Grawe has listed a wide array of inspirations for his work, both musical (1970s Krautrock -- particularly the namechecked Neu! -- and prog rock, vintage film soundtracks, Italo disco, Herbie Hancock, Stereolab...) and experiential (travel, friends, sunsets, windy roads, romance...) Which set of reference points is the more useful may depend on the listener, but the truth is that Colors of the Sun somehow manages to lives up to all of them. It will inevitably get lumped in with the Cosmic Disco movement (although little of it is remotely danceable) and the Balearic revival of the late 2000s, but this is a lovely and transporting listen regardless of times and trends, and one of the finest album statements that these loosely defined scenes have yet produced. Dig it.

Windsurf: bio and Coastlines review

One gets the sense that a lot of careful work went into making Coastlines the immaculately shimmering creation that it is, which is sort of a shame considering how difficult it is to concentrate on while it's actually playing. You could say that that's precisely the point, that this is music deliberately resistant to concrete awareness, its soft-focus surfaces designed to deflect attention away from itself and from anything else that might be going on. But there's a fuzzy line between getting lost in the music -- something these luxuriously extended grooves seem to invite -- and the music itself getting lost. Anyone who's enjoyed the solo work of Hatchback and Sorcerer (the two producers who make up Windsurf) will know what to expect here, and they are likely to be satisfied, as their collaborative material is very much cut from the same cloth: slow-moving, '70s-inspired semi-electronic tracks that blend Krautrock, disco, soft pop, and jazz fusion in a soothing, sun-dappled synthesis. A couple of tracks add understated, undistinguished vocals in a manner reminiscent of Studio (the Swedish fellow travelers whose music is among Coastlines' closest stylistic relatives), while a couple (synth-flecked "Pocket Check," goofy tropicale "The Big Island") boast beats bouncy enough to make dancefloor viability slightly more than a passing daydream. Otherwise, loungily lush widescreen epics are the order of the day, be they chugging ("Moonlight Sun"), tech-tonic ("Windsurf"), or amniotic (the shapeshifting, nearly beatless apotheosis "Crystal Neon.") To be sure, there is bliss to be had in these suspended moments, whether they come to you in a desk chair or a deck chair. But while artistic affect (as opposed to aesthetic qualities and craftsmanship, both of which are very finely defined in Windsurf's work) is especially difficult to assess in music that's so much about evoking emotional atmospheres, it's hard to shake the feeling that these California boys aren't glowing quite as warmly this time around.

Studio: Yearbook 1 and Yearbook 2 reviews

Studio's second Yearbook compilation is a collection of their remixes for other artists, rather than their own material, but their transformations are so thorough and their distinctive sonic fingerprints so prevalent that this is as good a place as any to get acquainted with the Swedish duo's lush, languorous style. Indeed, if not for the mötley assortment of vocals that occasionally intrude into the mix, ranging from Shout Out Louds' indie pop wispiness (on "Impossible," the most straightforward inclusion here) to Kylie Minogue's glam diva swelter (on "2 Hearts," an unlikely pairing that makes for a scintillating, revelatory high point), it wouldn't be hard to mistake Yearbook 2 as a more or less unified work by a single artist. As with Studio's original work, the agenda here is all about atmosphere. Whether the starting point is Love Is All's scruffy indie rock or Williams' faithful re-creation of Tangerine Dream's ethereal soundtrack work scarcely matters -- it all gets slathered with limpid laser-point guitar lines, washed out, reverberant synths, dubby disco grooves and, most prominently, immaculately crisp acoustic strums. Which is not to say that Studio are insensitive to their source material or that they simply work from a formula, they're just generally more interested in using it as a platform to their own ends. Certainly, they know what sounds they like and they stick with them, but their nuanced complexity and attention to detail, even on a hazy ten-plus-minute instrumental epic like their remake of A Mountain of One's "Brown Piano," is enough to rule out any notion of autopilot. Highest marks, however, go to perhaps the most minimalist offering here: a "version" (really a wholesale refashioning) of Rubies' soul-pop tune "Room Without a Key" which retains only the wordless background coos from the original as window dressing for an airy, hypnotic eight minutes suspended on a drifting, time signature-flouting bassline that feels utterly, impossibly fluid.

[Various Artists]: Permanent Vacation and Permanent Vacation 2 reviews

The inaugural release from Munich's Permanent Vacation label is an eponymous mix CD, compiled by label heads Benjamin Fröhlich and Tom Bioly, which feels very much as the title suggests: unhurried, luxurious, infinitely lush and relaxing, and warmly indulgent. It essentially embodies the spirit of the eclectic, laid-back, post-disco style of DJing and music-making, termed "balearic" in honor of the Mediterranean vacation spots whence it germinated in the mid-'80s, which was resurgently popular in electronica circles around the mid- to late 2000s. The differences between the vintage cuts and the work of the revivalists, while occasionally evident, are often strikingly hard to discern, which makes this both a cohesive listening experience and a decent argument for the cross-generational continuity of semi-electronic, slow to midtempo European disco music. All told, there is a stunning amount of gorgeousness on display here. Highly recommended to anyone curious about balearic or experimental disco, or anyone in need of a good pleasure cruise.

Permanent Vacation 2: On the whole, this mix feels more pedestrian than its inspired predecessor, maintaining a similar lilting spirit (with perhaps a slightly sharper dancefloor focus), but without so many unexpectedly magical selections. Still, it's nice enough stuff, and an admirably direct summation of an undeniable late-'00s zeitgeist.

Alexis Le Tan & Jess/Various: Space Oddities review

As per the subtitle, "a compilation of rare European library grooves from 1975-1984," these nineteen cuts of vintage library music -- that is, stock music composed and recorded for production music houses to be anonymously licensed for film and television -- are united primarily by their focus on rhythm and groove. Given the era surveyed and the fact that this collection was issued on the stellar electronic disco revivalist label Permanent Vacation, it's no surprise that most of the selections are of the funky disco persuasion, quite a few of them boasting some form of electronic instrumentation. Space Oddities was prepared as an evident labor of love by French DJs Alexis Le-Tan and Jess; one can only imagine the copious stacks of generic, hackneyed, and otherwise unfunky soundtrack fodder they must have waded through in order to glean these gems, and all of them are properly licensed and credited, which may well have required just as much effort. This is a true treasure trove of striking, inspired, and compositionally masterful material, selected with a DJ-friendly eye on the dancefloor, but containing enough unexpected twists to make home listening just as stimulating. Much of this material bears an undeniable likeness to the hippest cosmic disco sounds swirling out of Oslo and elsewhere in 2008. It will likely sound hopelessly kitschy to some, but for anyone curious about that recently spotlighted strain of electronica's patchwork heritage, or anyone looking for a freaky, funky good time, Space Oddities barely sets a foot wrong. Sensational stuff.