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The Notwist
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Description: | Gatefold LP on City Slang on 180 gram wax |
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| Format: | LP (vinyl) | |
| Genre(s): | Experimental Indie | |
| Label: | City Slang | |
| Price: |
£13.89
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| Availability: | Sold out / currently unavailable. Sorry! |
...according to our Brian on 05 June 2008.
TRACKLISTING: (1) Good Lies (2) where is this World (3) Gloomy Planets
(4) Alphabet (5) The Devil, You + me (6) Gravity (7) Sleep (8) On
Planet Off (9) Boneless (10) Hands on Us (11) Gone Gone Gone
Ltd version is in CD Book format with 22 page booklet and additional DVD track which is not on the non ltd format.
OVERVIEW:
For the faithful who swooned to The Notwist’s classic, widescreen 2002
album, Neon Golden, it has been a long six years waiting for the famed
Weilheim, Bavarian quartet to make a follow up recording. It’s fair
enough. Neon Golden is a hard act to follow – ravishing and emotionally
powerful, an album of highly original, electronically-infused
melancholia that sent the press into raptures, and drew fans from
Radiohead, Bjork and beyond.
But return they finally have, with
The Devil, You + Me. And it was worth the wait. An even more ambitious
and bolder musical adventure than its predecessor, awash with
overwhelming tenderness and emotional fragility, the album consists of
11 songs that deal with classic Notwist themes like love, loss,
alienation, the alignment of planets, good lies, death, refusal and…
the devil.
In the intervening years members of The Notwist - the
brothers Markus and Micha Acher, with Martin Gretschmann (aka producer
Console) - have been involved with at least six albums from exceptional
bands including Lali Puna, Console, MS John Soda, 13 & God and The
Tied & Tickled Trio. The Notwist toured the world, started
families, pursued interests in a widening circle of musical styles, and
acquired the kind of stature and following that belies their origins
deep in the woodlands of Bavaria.
On first listen, The Devil,
You + Me greets you like an old friend. Markus Acher's singular, aching
voice surrounds you with all the comfort of familiarity, and the
euphoria of re-acquaintance. This is an album driven by restlessness,
as found in both the searching and invention of the sonic ideas and the
lyrical narrative. It takes a while for the words and the scale of the
musical language to sink in.From the glistening guitars of opener ‘Good
Lies’, the cello-infused, haunting ballad ‘Hands on Us’, through to the
delicate end-piece ‘Gone Gone Gone’, the lyrics explore a world of
uneasy being.
Employing the stellar talents of the Andromeda Mega
Express Orchestra – a way-out ensemble of 20-odd classical musicians
specialising in a bizarre avant-interpretation of modern jazz, which
The Notwist remixed through their many fascinating electronic boxes and
gadgets and added their trademark heartfelt sentiment – ‘Where In This
World’ is another breathtaking moment, deploying strings and
orchestration in a fashion that greatly transcends the usual pomp and
circumstance of rock groups with big budgets: this is more like Morton
Feldman as filtered through an array of carefully underplayed
electronic treatments.
There are very few groups who could make
sense of material like ‘Your Alphabet’, a piece which combines droning
20th century dissonance with ear-shattering, electronically hacked
percussion – only to somehow produce an actual, coherent song at the
end of it all.
For all their inclinations towards the avant-garde,
importantly, this is a band who know when to play it simple as well: a
little further down the line you find yourself confronted with the
sheer eloquence of acoustic rocker ‘Boneless’, a three minute power
surge fusing motorik rhythms with restrained yet hugely effective
arrangements, quietly weaving strings and harpsichord into the very
fabric of the song.
And you're suddenly filled with the hope and promise that although it may take a while,
this isn't the last we'll have heard from him, or this incredible band.
