Apparat - The Devil’s Walk

I had a gripe last week about electronic artists putting vocals on stuff. On the opening track here Apparat do a nice if Sigur Ros-leaning track which carried on nicely from the Plaid album I've just got so excited about. Yet track two employs a vocalist, technically perfect but lacking so much in emotion that anything the music is attempting to project is flattened dead. This kind of X Factor approach to marrying electronic music to songcraft is a difficult thing to get right and alas what we have here is the sound of Chris Martin guesting on an M83 album or The National collaborating with Ulrich Shnauss. The Nico-like female vocals employed on 'Goodbye' work better and create the kind of middle of the road yet effective soundscapes Sigur Ros are so effective at and generally mesh with the music a little better hinting that the vocalist and the producer may at one point have met. Apparat is a talented producer as the shuffling beats of 'Candil de la Carlle' help give it a distinctive edge giving a hint at what heavily produced Postal Service follow up may sound like but overall its just a little too overdone.