amon tobin gets back to the biz-ness of releasing a proper album. following on from his recent forays into games soundtracks and solid steel chaos, foley room sees him stretching and flexing his musical muscle that little bit more.

for those that like the mechanics of musical production, it has to be stated that this album is, apparently, a step into the unknown with a lot of the music being crafted from real world noises that have then been stretched/sampled/deconstructed and anything else that modern machines can do to noise.

of course there are those of us who grew up with music that has been manipulated via samplers, whether it was the futuristic dance pop of the art of noise, the whole sample culture of the 90s, and just about everything else. so how is this album different from all those other noise tweakers ?

well to be honest, no bloody idea. but the people behind this album are so very proud and chuffed with the achievement that there is a dvd that apparently goes into more detail of the extreme high definition microphones etc that were used. scientific nerd ridden fan boy rubbish if you ask me.

bottom line is, does it make for a good album ?

to this listener, the answer is a mind bending, but definite yes.

for all the talk of science the actual music is very very listenable, with most of the results sounding like some high tech soundtrack for the best movie in the world ever.

what with the use of piano, drums and guitars (often of the twanged up variety) it’s not that hard to see that amon has a love for tradition as well as the unknown.

of course the addition of petal to the metal motorbike sonics during esthers make the track very dynamic which is beautifully juxtaposed against the rather delicate piano motif that is revisited later on during the albums 12 tracks. the intense drama created so far is pegged up yet another level with the metal clanking of the keep your distance proving that it’s only a matter of time before some big hollywood director contacts amon. the attention to detail in the dense layers of music is sometimes almost too much to take as each track twists and turns from spooked out ambience, to white knuckle ride intensity.

with some degree of expectation, the emotions are given time to recoup, the beats being pushed to one side, and eerie hitchcock’esque strings come to the fore with the lovely horsefish, but then its back to the drums and noise headfuck that is the melody free title track, which is basically a modern update of the old school improvised jazz drum solo.

vocal free the album may be, but these tracks are anything but bland personality free instrumentals that add weight to the hopes of a trip-hop revival.

the beats are sharply defined and raw, and will rattle any decent stereo system into willing submission, whereas the music that surround the drums is often stunningly beautiful and deeply atmospheric.

so, ignore the gumph re microphones and world travels collecting source samples, and instead, turn down the lights, and loose yourself in one of the best instrumental albums of the year.

oh, and the dvd edition in deluxe packaging is a limited release, and word reaches me that its not going to be available for that long, so scrap that download you have hidden away on your hard disk, and get the proper album, your stereo will indeed thank you. honest

 

more detail : here