Okay, I’ll admit it: there’s supposed to be a review of Draft 7.30 in this space. I know it and you know it. Thing is, I just can’t get my thoughts together on it, so I’m taking some time away from it. It’s not that I plan to say bad things about it, it’s just that I don’t know what to write yet.
Basically, I’m procrastinating. I’m very good at that sort of thing. In fact, I could say I’ve made an art form out of it. At least then I could feel good about it, but I’d be lying.
Thing is, there’s a part of me that’s just not always up for the challenge, and at the moment that’s the part that’s dictating my actions.
I’ll have a review up soon. I promise. Honest.
In the meantime, I give you the new Four Tet. I really enjoyed Pause when it came out, and for a few weeks it was in heavy rotation around the house. Other things came through the transom since then, and it’s been awhile since I’ve listened to it, so I really didn’t have any heavy expectations when I heard this was coming out. Almost by reflex, I went ahead and picked it up, and as it turns out, it’s exactly the right record for here and now.
Kieran Hebden’s music doesn’t show any great ambition on the surface. He’s not a noise terrorist or a math constructionist. It’s not music that requires much thought or effort-it pulls you into its gauzy world on its own merits, and once you’re inside, you realize just how meticulously constructed it is.
Pause was a record that evoked slow, hazy summer afternoons. It was languid, but hardly non-commital, and it managed to pull off the same sort of sepia-toned atmosphere as Music Has the Right to Children without sounding the least bit derivative. Hebden’s got a gift for making his computer manipulations sound entirely natural, and even when the electronic flourishes are obvious, the illusion is scarcely broken. His records show a real familiarity with the actual instruments he samples and a sense of articulation that eludes most of the laptop brigade these days. All through his records, you hear the peripheral sounds of fret buzz and amplifier hum, the types of sparks and half-missed notes that come with live performance. It’s this use of accidental sounds that makes for closer comparisons to acts like Sonic Youth or Yo La Tengo, even if only in spirit.
Rounds isn’t really a departure from the formula in any way so much as it is a progression. It’s certainly more immediate and focused, and the level of emotional involvement is certainly much higher this time around. Where Pause was sometimes noncommital, this record finds beauty in the cracks of plaster and shafts of dusty light, and it’s certainly a welcome change from most of the genre’s blind and dour worship of the glitch.
“Hands” opens the record with an ascending two-chord progression played by lightly picked guitar and organ while the drums warm up to a slow but loose rhythm which seems to wander around the Zildjian section of a music shop, delighting in everything they find. The familiar atmosphere is here, but somehow there’s a greater sense of urgency as the track builds on a slow crescendo but never quite releases. It’s a powerful opener, evoking a sense of wide, open spaces, similar in tone to Mum’s “Green Grass of Tunnel.”
“She Moves She” is the first single, and the first time I heard it, I didn’t care much for it, but hearing it context makes much more sense. It opens with a limber drum track overlaid with an absent-minded dobro that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Ben Harper record somewhere. In the chorus (of sorts), a distorted acoustic guitar sample stabs into the mix in a staccato patter just coherent enough to imply chord changes. It sounds like Fennesz, except more focused and driven. The verses are carried by a glockenspiel which manages not to sound the least bit fey, and toward the end, the whole ensemble is filtered down to single notes on the offbeat, and the track leans toward a two-step feel similar to “Untangle.”
“My Angel Rocks” rides an echoing loop of static and rimshots that sounds like something off Arovane’s excellent Tides while a fragile lullaby plays on a harp. Yes, a harp. In anyone else’s hands, that would send this straight into the eight circle of Windham Hill perdition, but before it can get cloying, a back-masked guitar fades into the middle register and turns the whole thing into an almost heart-wrenching chorale.
It’s worth mentioning at this point that several times on this album, I’ve actually caught myself holding my breath. No, really. It’s that good.
“Spirit Fingers” comes through like a whirling dervish, propelled by a double-speed guitar part that wouldn’t sound out of place on a Takemura record, especially when it’s overlaid with a frantic gamelan pattern. Just when the track starts to sound like an anomaly, a slowly picked acoustic guitar pulls the reins back. Not really a standout track, but by no means bad, either.
“Unspoken” lopes along like a Dj Shadow tune with guitar feedback floating over the mix. The piano part enters, and after about a minute, you realize that the melody is from Tori Amos’ “Winter.” With tamborines. This is where description falls short, because as awful as that may sound on paper, the whole thing actually works. It’s remniscient of μ-ziq’s appropriation of “Your Ghost”, except where that track simply used the original as an adornment, Four Tet uses it as a single motif among many. After the first verse, the piano part is replaced by a jazz progression with trumpets and cello, and when it reappears, it’s bolstered by a larger and different arrangement. I was really surprised by the mastery of structure and development here, since the track as a whole takes over nine minutes and never once lost my interest.
“As Serious as Your Life” sounds like like something out of some forgotten ’70’s police show, and while it’s hardly the most substantial thing here, it’s certainly clever and alot of fun in the same way “Everything’s Allright” was on the last record.
“And They All Look Broken Hearted” reminds me of a more relaxed Amon Tobin, with a nimble drum kit buoyed by a slow bassline. The whole thing boils away at a slow tempo, never really picking up, but never letting down either. This is mostly a track about atmosphere, and it works well in that respect.
“Slow Jam” is the closer, and it may be the best thing Hebden’s ever done. Ringing guitars enter over a slow beat, and I’m reminded of every rock song that ever rode itself out on a slow, glorious three-minute coda. The guitars and strings ride an aching chord progression that builds and recedes in a series of subtle climaxes while scattered vocal samples ricochet through the mix. There’s almost a melody in vocals, but it never quite coalesces, which is fine, because this is more about stroke and gesture than anything literal. Some part of me wants the voices to come in, but I know that, if they did, the whole delicate illusion would be ruined. The track feels like like the credits music for some alternate-universe John Hughes movie, and it doesn’t matter that it doesn’t really go anywhere, because you’re just happy to be held, suspended, while the landscape drops away below.