PHILIP SELWAY - Weatherhouse

Kategorie: CD-Reviews | Genre: Artpop/Pop | Heft: Jahrgang 2014, eclipsed Nr. 164 / 10-2014 | VÖ-Jahr: 2014 | Wertung: 8/10 | Label: Bella Union | Autor: AS


Drummers are often granted little or no harmonic understanding, let alone songwriter qualities. All the more exciting when a representative of this guild presents a solo album with which he takes this prejudice to absurdity. This happened in 2010, when Radiohead drummer Philip Selway presented flawless, passionate acoustic pop with "Familial", which attracted attention everywhere and had nothing at all to do with the musical experiments of his main band. Now the 47-year-old Englishman has explored new territory with the same people who helped him out on the EP "Running Blind" (2011) - Fridge bassist Adem Ilhan and multi-instrumentalist Quinta (including Sidekick on Bat For Lashes' tour with Radiohead). Or should one say better: new old? With "Weatherhouse", created at Radiohead's Oxfordshire studio and mixed by Welsh sound engineer and experimental pop expert David Wrench, Selway is getting a little closer to its original formation. Here, melancholic pop melodies are combined with spherical guitarlicks and manic-hypnotic electro sounds, as if Babybird and Massive Attack had married. The opener "Coming Up For Air" is the best example of this, as it burns itself into the brain at the latest on the third hearing. According to its title "Miles Away" moves even further away from common pop clichés: Here, the sugar-sweet vocal melody is juxtaposed with disturbing staccato sounds, which could also be located in Throbbing Gristle. In the ten pieces, spread over thirty-eight minutes, reality dissolves again and again in a pleasurable way.

Top track: Coming Up For Air

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