Frenchy’s Fracas

General Description

Artist/Band: Beck
Album Title: The Information
Year: 2006

It kinda grows on you..
 
How I Got Into This Music
Ah, read my review of his previous album, will ya? Just a bit more background info can be read here.

Google Search: Reviews of The Information | Review of this album at artistdirect.com | Album review at Answers.com | This artist at Last.fm

Tracks that got my attention:
Elevator Music
Strong links to his breakthrough single Loser, but I don’t mind. The keyboards for some mellowness and the guitars for acoustic and electric relaxation.

Think I’m in Love
Extreme melancholy but still kinda funny. Check out the music: it’s a big tip of the hat to movie mega-babe (now nutty far-right animal extremist) Brigitte Bardot’s Contact (have a YouTube experience, click here)

Cellphone’s Dead
It’s the weird combo of instruments that get to me: the 80’s retro-breaks combined with 70’s background vocals. The spooky synth bells-pattern reminded me of the Gorillaz’ DARE track, but maybe that’s just me..

Strange Apparition
With this track it’s easy: when he starts his vocals, I get a chill down my spine. And that piano gives us a great vibe, a kinda Neil Young thing, especially at the end.

Soldier Jane
Second friendly nod to Bardot’s Contact, but now with even more strong references. I like the lyrics on this one. The way the bass just drops by on this track is ultimate sweetness.

Nausea
Can’t quite put my finger on it - can’t remember what this song’s reminding of. Bass and strum guitars set a great pace, I love how he combines his samples with his instruments.

New Round
Lessons of the day
On a blackboard night
Seem to be erased
And the beacon has no light
Wow! There’s this sadness and warmth coming from this track, it tears your defenses down but also offers a nice warm blanket for protection.

Dark Star
Space age 70s drama, heavy on the string section. It took me some time to get used to it, but the harmonica sample helps a lot..

We Dance Alone
Not so impressive, still, a solid track.

No Complaints
Just love the synth-work on this song - that mellow spacey feeling!

1000BPM
Heavy fun-industrial-electro (new word? new genre?) music, another one that needed some time before I really started liking it.

Motorcade
Weird intro, love the sudden switch and the great low-low breakbeat. Listen to the beat during the chorus, frigging low! Another fantastic collage of sounds and beats (the whistle’s also very funny). And the stuff during the last 90 seconds - man-o-man! Retro feeling, taking you back to the breakdance, body-popping era.

Information
Chorus gets to me, every time.

Movie Theme
Yep, the title really fits the song. It’s taking you back to Vangelis and Jean Michel Jarre (and more recently:Air) . Another space odessey track and I love it.

Horrible Fanfare/Landslide/Exoskeleton
This track is so fucking (pardon my Frenchy!) weird. Listen to the gazillion different beats and samples happening on the background, foreground, in the middle, just everywhere! It’s collection of songs welded together to make this unbelievable construction. Steel guitar, easy rock guitar, weird breakbeats and samples, everything put together in a beautiful and weird way. With four minutes to go the track’s totally mellowed out and the last two minutes are just plain wacked out; not a lot of people will finish listening this one, but I enjoy it very much!

Conclusion
When I first started listening to this album somewhere in November 2006, I thought it was just like his Guero album: nice, but not really great. But I kept coming back to this album, something about it just clicked for me and if I’ve applied my limited writing talents correctly, the stuff I wrote before should give you an idea of just why it clicked).
The weird and haunting combined with the funny and mellow. The great collages of styles and sounds; my friend, you need to listen to this with headphones.
Believe it or not, this album’s one of my favorite albums of 2006.

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Music: saw that Beck’s new album The Information’s gonna be released pretty soon!
Blog todo’s: Outkast - Idlewild, and some classics
News: Thailand coup? Wow.. Budapest riots? Hmm..
Oh well..

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General Description
Artist/Band: Sia
Album Title: Colour The Small One
Year: 2005/2006

(image from artistdirect.com)

Funny and wicked lil pixie with a soft knee to the groin..
 
How I Got Into This Music
A while back, I was lucky enough to see Zero 7 live at Paradiso’s. It was a great gig and the most interesting thing was seeing the ladies that belonged to the vocals I knew from the Zero 7 albums. One of those vocals belonged to this weird jumpy blonde called Sia Furler. I had to check out her album, but when I finally got it I didn’t listen to it that much. Last January I had this urge to play the album and kept playing it ever since.

Album credits at ArtistsDirect.com
|| Lyrics at AlwaysOnTheRun.net

Tracks that got my attention:
(well, all of them actually, but still..)

Rewrite
I’ll slip through your hands
I am one single grain of sand
Great moodiness, nice low-key setup of the track

Sunday
Just love the wicked lyrics combined with the sweet vocals


Breathe me
This track’s her breakthrough song in the US - it was used in the HBO series Six Feet Under and got her some nice attention on that side of the Pond.
Ouch, I have lost myself again
Lost myself and I am nowhere to be found
I can imagine it working perfectly with the incredibly strong visuals of the TV series. What I like about it, is that it’s the perfect showcase for this girl’s talented brittle and whispery voice.

The Bully
Now this is the track that’s been haunting me the last few months!
Co-written with Beck, this track just breaks every bone and shatters every nerve in my body. It’s the childlike vocals and the simple but perfect musical arrangement that make this one of my favorite tracks ever!
What you been doing
Still make the world a better place
Never stopped rueing
Making those tears fall down your face

Sweet Potato
She cooks you sweet potato you don’t like aubergine
She knows to boil the kettle when you hum bars from Grease

The chorus’ been haunting my brain like forever.. How can (s)he become the psychic that she longs to be to understand you?

But it’s the whole sweet and lovely music combined with the real-life lyrics that everybody recognizes, that works so incredibly well. The lyrics, love em!
So give her information to help her fill her holes
Give an ounce of power so he does not feel controlled
Ouch!

Don’t Bring Me Down
Heavy and moody violins and again great vocals

Natalie’s Song
Just love the dub work on her vocals in the chorus

Butterflies
We’ve argued by the baggage claim
We’ve accepted and we’ve laid blame
Just love this one! It’s one of the greatest ways to describe relationships..
Because we came from the same cocoon

Moon
Love the chorus, chilling and haunting

The Church Of What’s Happening Now

Welcome to The church of what’s happening now
Head straight through, it costs nothing but change
Oooh.. These lyrics get to me waaay too much, heheh.. Another perfect track to show Sia’s talented vocals!

Numb
Man, just listen to that voice, okay? Just shut up and listen.. Can’t hurt to pay attention to the lyrics either..

Where I Belong
Closing track and I imagine it’d be an excellent closing song for a live gig.

Conclusion
This album also qualifies for the Reload Category, but it’s mostly a Favorite of mine.
I just can’t get that voice out of my head and I know this one’ll last for more than just a coupla months. The combo of nice-n-easy music, great vocals and sometimes very, very to-the-point lyrics is what makes this one of my Favorite Things.. Got to see this lady perform live.

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