Fontanelle - Style Drift
In which Zombie Miles Davis makes a psychedelic album for the sleepy.
If someone resurrected Miles Davis - we're talking Dark Magus-period Miles - and got him to record on the Leaf label, you'd pretty much have the sort of thing that Fontanelle specialize in: coasting, unresolving layers of sound that alternately intrigue, confuse and annoy. This means that if you're in search of the mighty power chord, you might as well give up now.
Style Drift finds this Portland-based quintet moving more towards the realm of rhythm-driven funk than spacey noodle, though both camps put in an appearance over the course of the disc. These songs are no great departure from any other Fontanelle release; the group still hasn't found the desire for climax - something that's undone them before, and does on some of the longer tracks here - but they're still making more than enough good compositional choices to hold interest for the duration.
Describing exactly how Fontanelle sounds is, as ever, a difficulty. Interstices is all low-end squelch, with muted tubular-bell tones ringing above the mix. Vaguely spy-like, the opener is perhaps the most upbeat part of the album - it's designed to get you moving without breaking a sweat. The best way to describe it? Picture a dream submarine, surfacing from beneath waves of warm organ fuzz. From below, the crew come to the deck and perform a synchronised stomp-dance along the deck, while wah jellyfish float alongside. That's what this is.
Of course, if that write-up sounds like a load of wank to you, you may not last long with the rest of the album. Fontanelle's tunes don't exactly follow the beginning-middle-end formula, and are more elliptical than most. In spirit, they're definitely closer to '70s extended jazz jams - two-hour, two-chord vamps that seem to go nowhere but make it awfully diverting to get there. There's a distinct Herbie Hancock influence here, implied by the warm, cheesy sounds that run through the disc, but what really makes Style Drift stand out in a field overrun by samplers is the keepin'-it-real use of real, honest-to-god miked instruments. Real drumbeats, real guitars; the distracted calm of classic funk-jazz and the sophistication of modern chin-strokin' music (hello, Tortoise!), but with a feeling of total honesty. It's sweet.
It may be something that won't get played a lot, but Style Drift - essentially a psychedelic disc for the sleepy - is intriguing, and it works. Why? More than most lounge electro acts, Fontanelle are in touch with where swinging-ass music comes from. Not a slavish copy, not overly worshipful, Style Drift is an album that will fit neatly between copies of Big Fun and Headhunters - high praise indeed.
This article originally appeared on splendidezine.com.
If someone resurrected Miles Davis - we're talking Dark Magus-period Miles - and got him to record on the Leaf label, you'd pretty much have the sort of thing that Fontanelle specialize in: coasting, unresolving layers of sound that alternately intrigue, confuse and annoy. This means that if you're in search of the mighty power chord, you might as well give up now.Style Drift finds this Portland-based quintet moving more towards the realm of rhythm-driven funk than spacey noodle, though both camps put in an appearance over the course of the disc. These songs are no great departure from any other Fontanelle release; the group still hasn't found the desire for climax - something that's undone them before, and does on some of the longer tracks here - but they're still making more than enough good compositional choices to hold interest for the duration.
Describing exactly how Fontanelle sounds is, as ever, a difficulty. Interstices is all low-end squelch, with muted tubular-bell tones ringing above the mix. Vaguely spy-like, the opener is perhaps the most upbeat part of the album - it's designed to get you moving without breaking a sweat. The best way to describe it? Picture a dream submarine, surfacing from beneath waves of warm organ fuzz. From below, the crew come to the deck and perform a synchronised stomp-dance along the deck, while wah jellyfish float alongside. That's what this is.
Of course, if that write-up sounds like a load of wank to you, you may not last long with the rest of the album. Fontanelle's tunes don't exactly follow the beginning-middle-end formula, and are more elliptical than most. In spirit, they're definitely closer to '70s extended jazz jams - two-hour, two-chord vamps that seem to go nowhere but make it awfully diverting to get there. There's a distinct Herbie Hancock influence here, implied by the warm, cheesy sounds that run through the disc, but what really makes Style Drift stand out in a field overrun by samplers is the keepin'-it-real use of real, honest-to-god miked instruments. Real drumbeats, real guitars; the distracted calm of classic funk-jazz and the sophistication of modern chin-strokin' music (hello, Tortoise!), but with a feeling of total honesty. It's sweet.
It may be something that won't get played a lot, but Style Drift - essentially a psychedelic disc for the sleepy - is intriguing, and it works. Why? More than most lounge electro acts, Fontanelle are in touch with where swinging-ass music comes from. Not a slavish copy, not overly worshipful, Style Drift is an album that will fit neatly between copies of Big Fun and Headhunters - high praise indeed.
This article originally appeared on splendidezine.com.
