Word: reverb
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...hooks. (Take a listen to the acoustic guitar in this segment from "Uptown.") One of the most interesting components in the Wall of Sound is the horn section, which modulates through the chords without accent, like a pianist who hits a chord once and then holds down the reverb pedal until the next harmonic shift. Other elements define the beat but the horns provide an invisible wash behind everything...
...long world tour," he says wryly. Now, with three new CDs and a 400-page, 167-tune Pat Metheny Songbook soon to be published, the affable Missourian who invented the most recognizable sound in post-bebop jazz guitar--warm, songful solo lines shimmering through a summery haze of digital reverb--shows no signs of settling into a comfy middle...
...hasn't changed is the thrill of hearing where Stereolab is going next, whether it's a casting out for funkier shores or spending a night in with Burt Bacharach and martinis. The next stop on their magical mystery tour? Soul. Not James-Brown-soul, although the drawn-out, reverb ad infinitum song endings the band took to performing at the Roxy do recall the virtuoso rock-outs that end so many soul anthems. This was soul as in a little jump start, an extra pumping in the veins...
...short, Stereolab live was very different than Stereolab in the stereo lab. The band's sound is characteristically everywhere: their records run th aural gamut from fuzzy lounge-lizard pop to gritty reverb rock (and most often are a synth-washed mix of both). Through it all, though, they manage to give you the cold shoulder. Morgane Lhote's Moog must have a special dial for "disaffected": a breath of chilling ennui blows through all their music, a vague sense of world-weary aloofness that has its heart somewhere in songwriter Sadier's low-mixed lyrics...
...that reverb overkill is all good all the time. The band best known for perfect mixes of diverse and often discordant sounds should have done a better job of mixing their set list. The first half left you with that cold Stereolab feeling inside; the first few songs after "Free Design," their most recent single, showcased their new-found rock-out tendency, leaving you reeling with the overwhelming strength of their steroid-pop. But after a while it started to grate on the eardrums and sounding the same, like the never-ending conclusion to a bad U2 song riddled with...