That, my friends, is the title to the new Stereolab album.. Assuming it's
the working title for the advance copy a friend of mine has. I listened to
it last night, and it's a vast improvement over Dots and Loops. There were
fifteen songs listed, but it seems like there's a lot more than that. It was
on a tape, so a lot of times we didn't know if one song had ended and
another had begun, or if it was still the same song. But, these are the
songs that were listed.
Fuses;
People do it all the time;
The free design;
Blips Drips and Strips;
Italian Shoes Continuum;
Infinity Girl;
The Emergency kisses;
DP Hop Detonation;
puncture in the radax permutation;
Velvet Water;
Blue Milk;
Caleidoscopic Gaze (yes it was spelled with a C );
Strobo Acceleration;
The Spiracles;
Come and play in the milky night;
There were a lot of jazz overtones, with a few orchestral moments. A lot of
the songs would start off with trumpets, sometimes muted, and build into the
beats, very Stereolab sounding Moog and blips and whatnot. It was a lot
different in most respects from their past stuff, but you could still
definitely tell it was Stereolab. Latetia did all vocals. Her usual mix of
English and French. Lots of times it was just kind of humming, you know.
Blips Drips and Strips reminded me a lot of Dots and Loops. With a title
like that, I kind of figured it would. But luckily it was the good parts of
Dots and Loops. There was no cover art on the tape. It was just a dubbed
copy with a xeroxed cover that looked like the usual press release advance
copy cover. I would definitely suggest that this album should be bought by
any one who likes Stereolab and if you dig jazz too, it will really put a
smile on your face. There were some homages I think to John Coletrane, and
perhaps Miles' late sixties stuff, along with the usual Stereolab beats and
sounds. But I would definitely say it's a vast improvement over Dots and
Loops. Borrowing some of the good ideas from that album, while moving ahead
in a different direction than any of the last albums. I was quite pleased
with it. And it should be out in a month.
Mark
