Future Sound of London - _ISDN_ (Virgin UK)
By now everyone knows that these two are talented, but nobody ever
claimed they had TASTE. FSOL's much touted fusion of jazzy hip hop beats and
their trademark psychedelic sound morphs is a straw man.
The prissily anemic faux-hop pounding of "The Far Out Son of Lung and
the Ramblings of a Madman" is as menacing as the clinically sterile bass and
trumpet cheese jazz of "Smokin Japanese Babe" is sultry cool. "Slider" gets
off to a better thumping start but is soon buried under an avalanche of
NIN-style guitar flatulence. Feh. Dougans and Cobain simply don't have the
intuitive feel for this style that makes its best examples work so well. The
badder they try to sound, the sillier they get.
Thankfully, the rest of ISDN finds FSOL further refining their
patented psychedelic electronic flux. Tracks like "Just a Fuckin Idiot",
"You're Creeping Me Out", "Dirty Shadows", and "Are They Fightin Us?" are the
new hymns of an emerging organic machine consciousness, working a bit of
acoustic bass in to good effect from time to time. FSOL's unique brand of
subtly aggressive ambiance buds all over the place like an out of control
virus, peaking in the gently kinetic "A Study of Six Guitars."
Most of the criticisms I've read of _Lifeforms_ strengthened my
suspicions that a lot of people just didn't get it. The more percussive ISDN
will probably appeal to a wider audience, but the album's strength is its
provocatively dissonant sound collages and not its half-hearted forays into
jazz and hip-hop. Unlike most of their contemporaries, FSOL fail because
their ambitions are too great. Expect great things to come.
Loop Guru - _Duniya_ (Nation Records)
Indian raga music and Polynesian percussion have more in common with
contemporary electronic dance music than many people suspect. _Duniya_ is an
inconsistent synthesis of a modern electronic intelligence and an ancient
acoustic soul that helps illuminate this relationship.
Loop Guru's best tracks marry an hypnotic dance floor groove with
rich textures borrowed from Indian classical music and Balinese gamelan. The
synergy of synthetic percussion and the complex tones of hand drums give
tracks like "Jungle A", "Senseless", and "Under Influence" a breathy
wild-eyed propulsion that could liquefy a dance floor at the proper volume
with deliciously deep melodics to caress open the third eye. "Tchengo"
weaves meditative tabla around graceful electronic drones and "The Third
Chamber (Part 4)" ends the album with a gentle splash of joyfully mournful
gamelan.
Other tracks suffer from the same weakness that cripples most of Sun
Electric's work. Dazzling tones and atmospheres are drowned under the weight
of a limp rhythm too tired for dancing and annoyingly repetitive through
headphones. Occasionally the formula works, but _Duniya_ would be a stronger
album at 45 minutes rather than 75.
Sabres of Paradise - _Haunted Dancehall_ (Warp)
A. Weatherall comes from deep left field with an album of punishing
tunes referencing everything from dub, hip-hop, reggae, spy movie themes and
even chilling ambiance. The Sabres' growth rate is phenomenal and _Haunted
Dancehall_ has got to be one of the most varied and accomplished albums of
1994.
The eerily echoing aquatics of "Bubble and Slide" devolve into the
minimalistic flanged razor beats of "Bubble and Slide II," setting the tone
for the rest of the album. _Haunted Dancehall_ resonates with the
hair-raising scrape of straightrazors and a rasping pulse that really makes
your speakers BREATHE. Pulsing and pounding syncopated riddim fucks in dark
alleys with bleating dirges, finally giving way to simmering, trucculent
atmospherics. Blaring spy-movie themes with brooding surf-guitar riffs cast
a ghostly cartoonish light and "Chapel Street Market" comes to the rescue
just in time with 7 minutes of breathtaking elevation.
Weatherall, Kooner and Burns shift from style to style effortlessly,
with humor, grace, and panache. It's time to acknowlegde some new masters.