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Building on the foundations of the old gothic/industrial school of Sweden,
as well as on the tradition of fun party music that dates back to
Abba,
Knife (the duo of Olof Dreijer and Karin Dreijer)
conceived two albums of dance music that was not simply upbeat and
retro but also deeply influenced by the zeitgeist of the 2000s:
The Knife (2001), with N.Y. Hotel, and
Deep Cuts (2003), with Heartbeats (their first hit).
Coming after the soundtrack Hannah med H (Rabid, 2003),
Silent Shout (Mute, 2006) emphasized the sinister elements of their
sound. The pulsating Silent Shout
(a mechanic ballet a` la New Order),
the Pet Shop Boys-esque meditation of
Marble House
and One Hit were counterbalanced by a profoundly emotional
undercurrent of angst-laden arrangements and vocals, notably in the
Brian Eno-esque vignette The Captain.
With this album Knife found the unlikely middle point between
German cabaret of the expressionist era and
Dead Can Dance's supernatural pop.
On the downside, the longest songs tend to be the least involving, evidence
of the duo's compositional limits.
Karin Dreijer started the solo project Fever Ray,
that debuted with Fever Ray (Rabid, 2009).
The protagonist is often the rhythmic base. The opener
If I Had A Heart is whispered over a sinister pow-wow pulsation.
A pseudo-gamelan polyrhythm propels the invocation of When I Grow Up.
Lazy synthetic rhythms and male-female harmonies weave a sense of magic in Dry And Dusty.
Ping-pong dance beats permeate Seven, wrapped in atmospheric synth lines.
Triangle Walks evokes Peter Gabriel's bouncy and hummable techno-ethnic ballets.
I'm Not Done is a simple lullabye driven by an industrial polyrhythm
that shifts from waltz to flamenco.
The seven-minute closer, Coconut, returns to the cryptic incantation of
the opener over a fractured equatorial beat.
Peaks of ambience (i.e. production) include the sense of hypnosis that exudes from
Concrete Walls, a song that sounds like it is played in slow motion,
and the sense of loneliness that exudes from
Keep The Streets Empty For Me,
wrapped in mournful drones as if it were a requiem of sorts but enlivened by a
Peruvian flute.
Melody-wise, the stand-out is Now's The Only Time I Know, that unfolds in a catchy crescendo over a sort of futuristic flamenco.
The vocals don't even come close to Bjork's
acrobatic logos but do exhibit some of Sinead O'Connor's
emphatic epos (without the virtuoso detours) and some of
Nico's glacial pathos.
Ironically, the lyrics are as trivial as it gets, mostly devoted to daily life,
so that the album could be viewed as an attempt at crafting a
domestic pop opera.
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