This week marks the return of continual updates at
www.electronicmusicreviews.com
Along with the Telefon Tel Aviv review below, there's also reviews of the
new Mum remix album, Proem's "Negativ", Tujiko Noriko's "Shojo Toshi," and
Bogdan Raczysnki's
"Myloveilove." Please check them out. Feedback would be nice.
Robert
Telefon Tel Aviv Fahrenheit Fair Enough (Hefty)
Chicago is a city of the arts. On any given night, the streets are
alive and the air imbued with electricity as hundreds of individuals make
there way from one locale to the next. Music and films and performance art,
oh my! It?s enough to constantly reaffirm even the most stalwart of
depressives. And yet, there are those nights when, despite the myriad
opportunities for cultural enlightenment and drunken tomfoolery available to
me, I opt instead to sit on my front porch, guitar in hand, staring at the
stars, making vague chords here and there, my mind wandering boundlessly.
Though there is no denying the gratifying nature of a night out on the town,
there are those times when this is all I really need; a night to myself.
From time to time, there is something to be said for simplicity.
Take the first offering from Telefon Tel Aviv. Foregoing the glitchy
percussion and mindbending mathematical structures currently all the rage in
the IDM community, Fahrenheit Fair Enough harkens back to a simpler time.
Telafon Tel Aviv are like those kids back in high school that were too
cool to care that they weren?t dressed in the latest fashions ? you know,
the ones you didn?t even realize you admired until a few years after the
fact. Rather than jumping on the newest, hippest fad, Telefon sculpts
intriguing music out of traditional electronic ideas.
From the album?s start, witch layers basic electronic cymbals over lush
processed guitar and bass, Fahrenheit Fair Enough is like a trip in a time
machine to the days when I first discovered electronic music. Over the
course of the album?s first minute, the programmed drums prove to be less
than simple, unfolding into a spastic collage of noises reminiscent of early
Aphex Twin.
?What?s the Use of Feet if You Haven?t Got Legs? develops in the
classic Bolero-inspired style of so much early 90s electronic music. It
begins with a single drum beat, and adds a new layer with each go round ?
some organ here, a few carefully chosen piano chords there. As the beats
grow crazier, other parts drop in and out. As the song moves to it?s close,
we?re left with nothing but erratic percussion, the background sparse,
reduced to nothing but a few diminished synth washes. Has it been done a
million times? Sure. But it?s hard to recall the last time I?ve heard it
done quite so nicely.
There are no spine-bending 200+ BPM songs here. Nor do Telefon Tel Aviv
bother themselves with the structural twists and bends of Paradinas or
Jenkinson. Programmed drums and beautiful sonic landscapes are the law of
the land here. Nothing veers too far from the formula, but the formula is
more than effective.
?Introductury Nomenclature? pits early 90?s hiphop beats and sound
effects against a high-pitched drone and a chopped up a guitar chord
progression, chopped up and loop. These disparate elements fall into place
nicely, before being locked in by a simple, yet effective bassline.
The album kicks into gear with ?John Thomas on the Inside is Nothing
But Foam?, a track which first appeared on this summer?s Lumptronic 4
compilation, which matches acoustic guitar and inquisitive bass to a driving
downtempo rhythm. Hollow synths and reverberated effects and an additional
acoustic guitar serve to add a lonesome Morricone-inspired feel to the
piece.
This sends Fahrenheit Fair Enough in a different direction. Built on a
piano dancing, punctuated with minimal percussion, and occasionally spliced
with manipulated vocal samples, ?Life is All About Taking Things in and
Putting Things Out? is custom built for late night ruminations. The next
song runs with the theme, starting silent and builds very slowly. For most
of ?Your Face Reminds Me of When I was Old? all we hear is percussion and a
few swooping drones, but as the song progresses, so too does the pace.
Telafon Tel Aviv are building back up again. Through with introspection,
they are ready to move on, ready to dance.
Life in a big city can be hard to adapt to. But even though Telafon Tel
Aviv only recently moved to Chicago, I?m not too concerned for them. The key
to a healthy, productive life in the Windy City, simply enough, is nothing
more than finding the right balance between celebration and relaxation.
These guys have already got that figured out. Consider Fahrenheit Fair
Enough your guidebook to comfortable urban living.
David M. Pecoraro
_________________________________________________________________
Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at
http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe, e-mail: idm-unsubscribe@hyperreal.org
For additional commands, e-mail: idm-help@hyperreal.org