Read & Listen

Interpol - Interpol
[Matador, 2010]

The fourth album in NYC’s Interpol discography became a self-titled one. There was talk about returning to the debut, but Paul Banks dismissed it, saying that the album will have “elegant, orchestral quality” and “some really classical stuff”.

The album is of a gently kind. There’s as if more space and air than there was in the preceding Our Love To Admire (2007).

On Summer Well the music shakes off the remains of the sleep and starts to get pumping. Just in time - the following track is the album highlight, Lights. Upbeat, with a hint of the ’70s art rock, but less pretentious and with more focus on melodies. Barricades shows some raw sounds, without much noise in it, but with a forward rhythm section, after which Always Malaise (The Man I Am) the guitars give way to beautiful keyboards and everything drowns in slow and somewhat sad beauty. All Of The Ways in a while catches up the slow tempo, adding transparency to the album.

Stylistically Interpol is a step forward compared to its predecessor. The 2007 album was more “about noise”, here its about keeping you involved and in-the-mood throughout the whole album. There’s the post-punk meat to it, and at the same time your ears aren’t overloaded with noise, but pick up the narrative part of it. You follow the story of the album and the change from the beat to the slow, from the raw indie rock to the compliments towards shoegaze and dream pop, in the middle and towards the end of the album.

Read & Listen:
Interpol Myspace

Lights by aqnb

Success - Interpol by oldwaver

Sorry, this entry is only available in Russian.

Aroop Roy - Nomadic Soul
[Freestyle Records, 2010]

Aroop Roy is an artist and producer living in Tokyo and (currently) in London, and traveling the world bringing jazzy and breakbeat atmosphere. Nomadic Soul is his debut album, after numerous collaborations with other artists as a producer - among these being Kyoto Jazz Massive, Bugz In The Attic, Patrick Forge, Laurent Garnier. Despite the fact that he was more dragged into work as a producer, he’s been catching up as a musician in the past years, writing material for Nomadic Soul.

it’s impossible to put Aroop Roy in a specific catalog folder. One moment it’s funky grooves, another he adds up rap (Stand Up with an American rapper Replife), then comes some Latin America (a gorgeous Too Long)… Funky The Lonely Years was recorded in a collaboration with Sacha Williamson, it sets up the mood for the whole album - upbeat and light, but confident dance. Ain’t That Sweet with female rap and soul vocals courtesy of Sara Gis and honey brass tunes is a definite dancefloor hit. Oi Do Do Le is another magnetic danceable ethnic piece on the album. And to conclude this 11-track wonder is a purely atmospheric and lightweight melodic Lilly (thanks to a British jazz vocalist Sarah Winton).

Nomadic Soul is a perfect debut and a very diverse album. Exquisite, light, diverse in style. Perfect for summer weekend parties or a buoyant workday night. Album coming out on Freestyle Records in September

Read & Listen:
Aroop Roy Myspace
Interview with Aroop Roy

Aroop Roy - Nomadic Soul by Freestyle Records

Fredator - Bad Jazz
[Suomen Musiikki, 2010]

Fredator is five Finnish guys in suits and neckties, playing jazz. Eight tracks lasting for 3/4 of an hour make Bad Jazz album. The name is quite untrue, as this jazz is really exquisite and good. Music rooted in the ’50s and sounding ever as fresh and fun today. Jussi Fredriksson is the main hero and the composer in Fredator, and he is to blame for transforming dull reality in a colorful weekend and celebration of life.

The very essence of music is its dynamics, and it’s never as visible as with jazz. The cohesion of instruments, the ability to listen to what others are playing ad at the same time create a masterful improv of your own is what makes it momentary and beautiful. Bad Jazz is deep and light, transparent and solid at the same time. Melting saxophone, steady advance of drums, agile and fluid keyboards… And all these come together in a wonderful harmony - which is hard not to dance to, at least in your head. This is the music that creates an atmosphere of rest and joy around it.

Read & Listen:
Fredator MySpace

Listen in Eric Tchaikovsky’s Night Light Radioshow

New Jens Lekman single “The End Of the World Is Bigger Than Love” is available for download at Service website.

A song pleasant in all respects (what else did you expect from Lekman?) about love, explaining that broken heart is not the end of the world. And stories about many ways a heart can be broken. Familian Jens Lekman sound - romantic melody over a light rhythm. Everything is here to listen in consolation and joy.

Download The End Of the World Is Bigger Than Love

Math and Physics Club - I Shouldn’t Look As Good As I Do
[Matinee, 2010]

It’s been three years since we heard from these Seattle indie kids, Math and Physics Club. And here it is, their new album I Shouldn’t Look As Good As I Do, where everything, from cover image to songs (and album) titles screams indie pop!

As it’s expected from Matinee Records and as the genre suggests, the album primarily has songs about love and hearbreaks, and is generally a classic example of as-if-homemade music. A relaxed vocals, unobrtusive guitar melodies in the style of the 80s… Everybody Loves a Showtune has an unexpected bajo and trombones appearance. And in general, the album is perfect for summer light-minded rest. It’s a big more “high-end” in terms of production as compared to the debut one, a little bit less of a twee-pop stamp, but still light and simple.

Opener Jimmy Had a Polaroid demonstrates a very recognizable MAPC - it’s one of not-so-utterly-love songs, on the rest of the album titles like Trying To Say I Love You, Will You Still Love Me?, Love or Loneliness prevail… Each song is like a non-professionally taken picture, without any visible value for the world culture, but reminiscent of a special moment in your life, timely captured. And such pictures become sweeter to your heart than all the art in the world, bringing warmth and sincerity.

One of my most favorite songs of the album is the final, We’re So DIY!

But we’ll be the indie stars
that everybody hearts

I got my casiotone we can do it on our own
everybody knows
we’re so DIY

Beauty in simplicity, making life easier at once.

Read & Listen:
MAPC official website
Myspace
Jimmy Had a Polaroid mp3

Max Richter - Infra
[130701/FatCat, 2010]

When it gets hot outside, the need for a cooler, night music grows. Max Richter is by far the best soundtrack for making the summer heat stop and meditate about the eternal things to piano chords in minor.

Infra, as all of Richter’s music is, is intimate, subtle and profound. Clear piano prevails, with additions of strings and some electronic effects. This music makes you work like those workaholics in a movie, who hang over computer keyboards, drafts, sketches and notes till dawn… The music makes you fall into a kind of work rage, switch everything else off and focus. At the same time, it can be a perfect ambience for meditation, relaxing and pondering about life. The choice of activities is all yours, Max Richter only provides aerial, light, transparent soundtracks.

The album was born from the last year’s Richter’s collaboration with choreographer Wayne McGregor and artist Julian Opie for The Royal Ballet. Separate tracks on the 30-plus minute Infra were born from a 25-minute original piece.

Richter’s special is always a masterful melancholy and bringing in a little bit (and sometimes more) of tragedy. This is especially handy when it comes to his involvement in the soundtrack for Scorsese’s “Shutter Island”, but can also be a great ambience for an easy sad mode in life.

Read & Listen:
Max Richter

Infra by max richter

Pan Sonic - Gravitoni
[Warp, 2010]

Gravitoni is literally the latest and possibly the last work of the Finnish duo Pan Sonic. lpo Väisänen and Mika Vainio decided to close (or at least freeze) what has been one of the best experimental electronic project of the past two decades. The classic Pan Sonic sound is of abrasive, harsh and inedible nature. This metallic cold and massive presence of non-organic structures in music makes a great impact on summer heat, letting your melting brain get back to a thinking mode. Static electricity is transmitted into your biological organism and lets it better cooperate with equipment - from computers to toasters. If you’re not going on vacation to the sea, for chill-out relax, Pan Sonic is exactly what a modern-day robot of the office environment needs.

Something like Morse code, lengthy drilling sounds, hissing, rasp, grinding, gritting, rhythmic patterns of metal and lacunae in proper places. Some tracks (like Fermi) are softer, there are very atmospheric elements - Väinämöisen Uni/Väinämöisen Dreams, Suuntaa-Antava/Indicational and Hades. There are harsher ones, like Voltos Bolt and Corona. The final chord, Pan Finale is a beautiful piece of soft beats and viscous melody, almost hidden behind them.

Gravitoni is like a lost world or an unreachable galaxy. It’s a cool/cold place, maybe not too welcoming at first sight. A wonderful release before Pan Sonic falls into deep freeze.

Read & Listen:
official website
Myspace

PAN SONIC - Pan finale by itsakirby

M.I.A. - /\/\ /\ Y /\
[N.E.E.T., 2010]

If the roots of music are in the ancient human instints towards noise and reaction to it, then the new M.I.A. album appeals to the primal in us. She grew in agression and “non-music” sounds. Metal-loaded thunder, with music derived from unpleasant at first sight noises.

The opener, The Message, seems to be created based on Fujiya & Miyagi’s “Collarbone” (though officially not stated). On Stepping Up the drills step up, getting the “normal” understanding of music out of your head and tuning you into M.I.A.’s style, with occasional swear words and primeval rhythms. XXXO is already known to those who like M.I.A., it’s one of the most ‘digestible’ and melodically simple songs of the album, also being an official first single. But even its melody is superimposed on the remnants of the savage in us. Other highlights are a reggae-style It Takes A Muscle and Born Free, also known for the video that invaded the internet a while ago. Overall, the album is quite heavy and raw.

/\/\ /\ Y /\ mght not be the most successful M.I.A.’s album, and definitely not the pop one. Probably this was done on purpose, as a statement against the artist’s growing popularity. It’s loud and savage - perfect if you want something to match an aggressive mood.

Read & Listen:
M.I.A. official site
M.I.A. Myspace
Born Free

Matthew Herbert – One One
[Accidental, 2010]

Matthew Herbert is a recognized experimenter with sound. Music, harmonies and mood are not enough, that’s why in each album he releases there are additional layers of interpretation and meaning. He makes you not only listen to music, but to focus, single-task,… think, after all. He already used sounds of chicken farm, industrial processes, human sounds, music recorded at a substantial height or underground as deep layers. His current album, One One, is the first volume of a trilogy and should represent a day in the life of… The following albums will be One Pig (sounds sampled from one pig) and One Club (noise of a club crowd). The tracks on One One are named after places – from Valencia to Tokyo, from Manchester to Milan. The geography is pretty wide, so are the patterns used in music. Herbert prefers to paint his soundscapes with a few strokes. You only see general, brighter lines at first, guessing the silhouettes. And then you start looking into a seemingly monochrome grey background, where you find the subtlety of lines and the artist’s mastery.

This way or another, you have to deal with context. Matthew Herbert is not someone who makes loud statements. He talks to those who are ready and want to listen. And if you let yourself dive into the intimacy of this album, you can hear a lot of things – from the lyrics almost whispered to your ear to the ornaments and halftones of the melodies. All this makes Herbert one of my all-time favorite artists.

By the way, One One made me re-listen to Bodily Functions – the album that turned my world upside down in early 2000s. Same relaxed and easy feel about it, with Matthew Herbert’s vocals (himself!). The only thing lacking is probably Dani Siciliano’s vocals as well.

Read & Listen:
Official website
Myspace
Matthew Herbert bio