Four Tet, Explosions in the Sky, From Monument to Masses, Tomas Dvorak

There is Love in You

Kieran Hebden's new album just came out, and it's different from his earlier stuff. I love the second track, "Love Cry", which starts out like "She Moves She" with good lo-fi IDM texture and great driving jazz drums. But then it veers off at 4:23 with the vocal track. There aren't any lyrics to speak of: it's all melody and texture infused with club energy, and it's sublime.

"Sing" has, of all things, chiptune instruments; this isn't the folktronica that defined Pause and Rounds. This is far more melodic and focused, which might be reason for some to dislike it, but I'm really loving the new direction.

The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place

The Earth is Not a Cold Dead Place is some excellent post-rock. Head-rolling-back, standing-on-tiptoe, arms-outstretched-in-rapture good. The band calls their songs "cathartic mini-symphonies", and I'm inclined to agree.

It sort of reminds me of Godspeed You! Black Emperor—and more than in the way that all post-rock reminds me of Godspeed—but without all of the soul-crushingly depressing bits. The Earth is nostalgic, emotional, and even dares to be optimistic in a genre that will otherwise be used to score the post-apocalypse.

On Little Known Frequencies

Based on Explosions in the Sky, Joe and Jon turned me on to From Monument to Masses. Joe described them as "like Explosions, maybe less epic, but with more of a pulse." It's a good description.

The opening track makes me think of Battles for some reason, but the real winner here is "An Ounce of Prevention". The gorgeous instrumental rock slowly builds to a crescendo when it suddenly drops out for a sample of Mario Savio's "Bodies upon the gears" speech:

There is a time when the operation of the machine becomes so odious, makes you so sick at heart, that you can't take part. You can't even passively take part, and you've got to put your bodies upon the gears and upon the wheels, upon the levers, upon all the apparatus, and you've got to make it stop. And you've got to indicate to the people who run it, to the people who own it, that unless you're free, the machine will be prevented from working at all!

And on that last word the band suddenly thunders back in, picking up where it left off but stronger and fiercer, and it's really something to listen to.

The album is political, it's moving, and it's excellent.

Machinarium Soundtrack

I picked up the brilliant adventure game Machinarium over the winter holidays and was surprised to find it came with a copy of the soundtrack. It’s electronic ambient with jazz trimmings and a lot of chip and glitch beeps mixed in with the lo-fi aesthetics I've been loving so much lately. It’s perfect in-game—"Clockwise Operetta" gave me chills—but the album holds up decently well on its own. It's heavy on the atmosphere, solid in its execution.

If you pick up the game and soundtrack, make sure you also download the free Machinarium Bonus EP which includes the hauntingly beautiful "By The Wall" and the absolutely imperative "The Robot Band Tune". That song gets me dancing just like the main character from the game.