jackson and his computer band - smash
debut album for this new french electronica hero. combining all manner of electro glitchey noise and melody. the album opens with the three best tracks which were lifted for an ep - utopia, rock on, and arpeggio. where the fun factor is very much to the fore as well as a strong understanding of the pop dance formula, despite these commercially strong tracks being buried by the mans uniquely sonically deep production. f
the metallic rhythmic tracks are cutup and mutated a la fellow labelmate prefuse 73, sometimes an ambient styled melody is pushed out adding some form of structure, for example during 'oh boy', with its child read narration, often teeters on the edge of sanity, becoming just too broken to be fixed as a permanent fixture to the play list. during the hour long journey, there are sections where things all click into place, especially on the album highlight, 'tv dogs', where dramatically cinematic electro pulses do battle with an old school analogue synth, its single finger melody domination prior to the hip hop beat vanishing thus revealing a void into which mike spits his terror noir lyrics is brilliantly executed. dark, imposing and by far, one of the best things on offer. making us wish that jackson had extrapolated this kind of idea (ie more vocal collabs!) across more of the album. also, the unusually named 'hard tits' is a few minutes of welcome respite, processed piano notes and distorted electro ambience prove that all the hopes re jackson are quite probably justified.
from here on however the album can become a little hard going in places. the urge to experiment dominates throughout, as opposed to actually making something that is enjoyable (though the almost danceable 'tropical metal' is rather fine - more echoed piano and disjointed glitchy beats), so while you appreciate and admire the mass of ideas that fly by per track there is little that actually connects amongst the digital chaos making the album end up being left sit on the shelf as opposed to jumping out and demanding more airplay.