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September 13th, 2006 by Jonathan Fletcher (Permalink)
Label: Mordant Music Year: 2006 Add Comments |
At last, the long unanticipated Saint Etienne/ Throbbing Gristle crossover! And of course, any project worth its salt needs a figurehead. Saint Etienne had Sarah Cracknell, TG had the marvellous Mr P-Orridge, Velvet Underground had Nico and Mordant Music have er, Philip Elsmore. Before you say anything, if you’re over 20, you actually do know who the wonderful Mr Elsmore being as he was an ITV announcer for nigh on 30 years both uttering the first and last words heard on Thames TV. These are new vocals though as opposed to nicked, Elsmore proving extremely game for a laugh by recording a script from the Mordants.
Anyway, to the matter in hand. Dead Air then is a concept album of sounds, a post-apocalyptic ghost TV transmission and incredibly fine it is too. Simon Reynolds has already made mention of Ghost Box (what? who? seeing as how you’re online now, check it after reading this and discover the finest british label of the decade) and sure enough, there is a deep rooted feel of England permeating this music not merely with the presence of our hero but with various fragments and samples (forgotten bursts of TV, Eno etc.) and a love of every conceivable genre of electronic music and as they themselves put it, “a uniquely British tone of despair and decay”. But this despair directed by Cosgrove Hall (you young ‘uns, where have you been- Dangermouse, Chorlton & The Wheelies etc) as opposed to Misorrisey. As techno savvy as it is, Dead Air fucks with your memory, displaces your own history- scrambles your hard drive…
The overall sound is initially superficially easy to pin down- electronic technoid pieces, danceable but also about something so with a peculiar depth that can be enjoyed in your comfy chair with a nice cup of ovaltine should u wish, which is no mean feat (I mean the danceable listenable thing, not the ovaltine chair routine). But closer inspection reveals a wealth of weird texture- dance clichés appear but twisted and subverted- everything sounds slightly over-inflated (I don’t mean pompous, more like the difference between a balloon and a water balloon).
Just for some examples then, the music flits between melodic (‘Transmission Start-Up’ and ‘Expendable Productions’) dancefloor (10 fantastic sprawling minutes of ‘We are The Mean’) and more outré experimentalism like the starkly dark drift of ‘The Black Crush’.
This is a real one-off, imbibed with a rare sense of invention whilst simultaneously keeping its foundations solidly rooted on a thumping earth. It’s also beautifully (and awkwardly) packaged, quite bonkers and rather lovely. Off you go then.
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