Smoke: Groove

Zeitgeist. Caned & Able - Smoke

Cheesus, I feel quite wasted after that! In fact, it's probably the furthest gone I've been sober, since the night I slept in the dub tent at Glastonbury back in the [koff] early eighties. Yes, Patrick Bird and Martyn Savigar have returned with a truly bizarre and captivating set of mishity mashups, mixes, loops and doohickeys, quite unbecoming in anyone over twenty one.

They've brought along a few people who were once nearly famous such as former Specimen and Siouxsie & the Banshees guitarist Jon Klein and drummer Chris Bell, who I once saw playing with Spear Of Destiny. They were shite. Dead people being easier to work with, there's also appearances from Billie Holliday, Marc Bolan and John Peel. It's a strange old world where the ghosts of Astralasia and Future Sound Of London take Moby outside for a good kicking, then proceed to show the world how This Sort Of Thing should be done.

And it's ended up the kind of album that just lives permanently in your hi-fi and slowly drives away your few remaining friends as you tell them how they Must, I Repeat, Must, listen to 'Orchestra' through headphones. That's when you're not extolling the far out alien rock of 'Deuteronomy' or the sublime Billie Holliday sampling in 'Trav‚Äôlin Light'. For sure, there are a couple of tracks where the spectre of a Guardian readers dinner party looms into relief, but if you bat those aside, there is a wonderful adventure here for all to enjoy.

If you want to pick one song to demonstrate the wonders contained herein, go for 'Deaf Aid', which features Canadian jazz chanteuse Anna Jacyszyn, and prepare to be gently blown away into another world.

Smoke gets in the Groove (i Svensk)

English club music duo Martyn Savigar and Patrick "Trickster" Bird continues his sound experimentation and this time it takes using the old Siouxsie and The Banshees guitarist Jon Klein, drummer Chris Bell and singer Anna Jacyszyn.

And the music of Smoke is a mixture of so many different genres that it is almost impossible to mention them all. There is everything from the initial electro rock numbers, house and totally freaked out ambient music. It lends fresh out of music history and names of Billie Holiday, Lou Reed and Catatonia can be sensed in the soundscape is built up. It is exciting and to some extent even more than original, the only question is how lyssningsbar and commercial feasibility of this type of music is? Some will see it as a cross masterpiece, others as a massively useless wedding. Of course, I am a bit scattered somewhere in between, but finally realizes that this is a lot of goodies hidden under the surface that it takes a few listens to find. I take my hat off and thank Martyn and Patrick for a work of art in which beauty more than ever before is in the eye of the beholder. Best Track: Killa sound.

Original Swedish:

Engelska klubbmusikduon Martyn Savigar och Patrick ”Trickster” Bird fortsätter sina ljudexperiment och den här gången tar man hjälp av gamle Siouxsie and The Banshees-gitarristen Jon Klein, trummisen Chris Bell och sångerskan Anna Jacyszyn.

Och musiken på Smoke är en blandning av så många olika genrer att det är snudd på omöjligt att nämna dem alla. Här finns allt från de inledande electrorocknumren till house och totalt utflippad ambientmusik. Man lånar friskt ur musikhistorien och namn som Billie Holiday, Lou Reed och Catatonia kan förnimmas i det ljudlandskap man byggt upp. Det är spännande och till viss del även högst originellt, frågan är bara hur lyssningsbar och kommersiellt gångbart den här typen av musik är? Vissa kommer att se det som ett gränsöverskridande mästerverk, andra som ett massivt meningslöst bröl. Själv står jag lite splittrad någonstans mittemellan, men inser till slut att det här finns en hel del godis gömt under ytan som det tar några lyssningar att hitta. Jag lyfter på hatten och tackar Martyn och Patrick för ett konstverk där skönheten mer än någonsin förut ligger i betraktarens öga. Bästa spår: Killa sound.