king of woolworths - rediffusion
for jon 'for i am a king' brooks third album we must forget all about his previous forays into the pop world with collaborations with various leftfield pop people, for this is a very different affair on a new label for the king - lo recordings. having declared his love in various interviews for the genre that is 'library music', it was only a matter of time before he made a complete album dedicated to the style. now, i will have to admit that upon seeing this term several times, i didn't really understand what it was all about, but then i looked it up. and you know what ? it's the music that the bbc used to play over that test card prior to 24*7 tv broadcasts, oh happy days.
and, once that is understood then this album does indeed make a lot more sense as the sweet melodic orchestrations, electric piano, oboe, analogue synths have a certain innocent charm about them - and this is only the first track 'coccolo'. the mood throughout the hour is very autumnal, instrumental, and laid back. often lulling the listener into a welcome state of timewarped calm. as the tracks pass over you there is a realisation that jon has crafted a lovely album with serious levels of attention being paid to the sonic detail, which can at times veer into realms of muzak, a little too closely in some places. for example, the glockenspiel overloaded '7 tranches' is just a tad too "sunday afternoon in a french park kicking leaves and acting all mushy with your beloved" for my liking, but i suspect that this is precisely the kings intentions. luckily though there are standout tracks that keep popping up to break the flow, whether it's the spoken/found voices and big fat beat of 'big sur', the darker more disturbing moods of 'yellow world' with its sci-fi vocals and atmospheric soundtrack opening before dropping into a great big fat beat with dirty electro noises, or, the bongo craziness that is 'barillas'.
throughout jon has recreated some fantastic sounds with his old sound making machines, like luke viberts project, wagon christ, who also has a passion for certain types of 70's electronic analogue noises, but where this differs from the recent wagon christ album is that jon uses these sometimes annoying squelchy noises sparingly and matches them against some gorgeous melodies as opposed to focussing purely on the sound. best example has to be 'music for schools', which starts to annoy but it's not too long before the beat kicks in and the atmospherics are fleshed out so that the level of cringe some synth noise is reduced somewhat. unfortunately the opening few seconds 'crazy lions' is hard going, a mad beat driven by ear splitting clashing synths opens the track prior to an old fashioned guitar makes a welcome and unexpected appearance moving the track into far more interesting new spaces.
as is to be expected, the final selection of the album drifts on nicely and mellows out with its various layers of familiar sound scapes for those of us of a certain age. living up to its premise of a homage to the bbc radiophonic workshop's electronic music output of the 70's, prior to the saturation of the clean digital productions of fairlight cmi's (the tool of the trade for many of the big pop records of the 80's) and more recently, of course, protools. little else really stands out though, other than jon brings the album to a brilliant close with the scratchy jazz piano finale of 'stimulus progression'
for anyone who read my previous words on previous albums will know that i liked the previous pop stylings, but they did make for an uneven listen. this, however is a consistent, solid album. an hour long instrumental electro-acoustic soundtrack that given some time and love really pays back the listener in unexpected levels of nostalgia and emotion.
all in all, a lovely alternative to the thrusting beats and sharp noises of the modern world.