Labels: Domino
Review by: Chris Bress
Save for the opening banger “Everything Ecstatic” is Four Tet’s most accessible full-length to date. It doesn’t have anything extra to bring to the party that his other records have, but if your not feeling cynical it’s quite fun.
“A Joy” opens with dark, distorted drums that echo and in a live setting at the right volume would bounce you around. It soon cuts into “Smile Around the Face”, the ideal Summer single (reviewed elsewhere). I do feel that both tracks sound good together but it reeks of trying to “shock” Guardian readers, imagine it, “oh! It’s so noisy! I’ll have to take it back to ASDA! Phew! This next songs more like it!” Pretty annoying.
The rest of the album reeks of slightly subdued, but well produced and inventive, poppy breakbeat / electronica (with his ever present folk elements). “Sun Drums and Soil” features great live drums and jazz horns, but the repeated vocals push it slightly towards the Chemical Brothers playing Glastonbury.
Most cuts work, and if your open to this sort of muzak you’ll thoroughly enjoy it. It hasn’t quite grabbed me in the same way as “Rounds” or his last two mix cd’s did, but I think this is a cracker.