Brave Captain – I Am A Lion Downloadable EP
[bravecaptain.co.uk, 2003]
{8.4}


This free EP finally assimilates the pop awareness of Martin Carr’s distant past to his recent bugger and pillage Tigerbeat6 experimentations. “Enlightenment” seems to snag itself on a hard disk error halfway through, before righting itself and ending on a plastic party horn payoff. Note to Beach Boys fans: the cloudless sky backing vocals and Moon Safari vocoder on “The Wichita Airport Motel” prove that The High Llamas don’t have exclusive access to the voice boxes of Carl and Dennis Wilson’s bloated corpses.
[Scott McKeating]


Heiko Voss – I Think About You
[Kompakt Pop, 2003]
{8.3}


Featured prominently in Michael Mayer’s recent Fabric mix, this single is the third for the pop arm of Kompakt enterprises, continuing in the tradition of Oxtongue and Phong Sui quite admirably, if not outstripping their previous efforts. The key to the single, oddly, is not the relative strength of each individual piece, but how each mix plays off one another. The Geiger Mix is a neat complement to the original, making the song a dancefloor stomper, while DJ Koze extends, literally, the bliss for seven minutes before the Adolf Noise mix ends the single in a haze of half-forgotten memories.
[Todd Burns]


Allegorical Power Series - Volume VI
[Antiopic, 2003]
{7.3}


Antiopic’s freely downloadable Allegorical Power Series is now in its sixth installment of “addressing the possibilities and roles of abstract or experimental music as social and political response.” And while sometimes the artistic output presented here are less than stellar examples of certain improv groups working in the same traditions, the context in which they are presented forces the listener to take these works in a different light. Thus, “We’re Breaking Up” is transformed from semi-interesting radio transmission into a critique of the commercialization of London’s pirate radio stations and the excellent Julien Ottavi and Dion Workman collaboration, “Beginning Again” can be about the limitless possibility of new music. At the very least, the arguments and ideas being presented by artists each month in this series are worthy points of discourse that have lay dormant in a wider arena for far too long. It is a project that needs to be highlighted and, consequently, discussed.
[Todd Burns]


Living Ornaments - Klonten ep 3"
[Scarcelight, 2003]
{4.1}


See, the thing about pop music is production. Pop music has to sound impressive in order to work. That means that most really good pop music is created in big studios with big budgets and big-time producers. If you're creating pop music in your bedroom or in a bathroom, it'll end up sounding like a low-grade version of bigger and better produced hits. That's the problem with Living Ornaments EP. This Dutch duo obviously has a keen, atmospheric pop sensibility (think Air or instrumental Björk), but the sound quality and the production can't keep up with their ideas. The result is rather tepid pop songs that don't inspire or impress.
[Michael Heumann]