(05.05.07) There must be something in the water. How else to explain Scotland’s begetting of a stream of electronic acts with that far-off gaze to the horizon combined with melancholy-soul undertow. The debut release from Rubens, a duo comprising Mark Flanagan (also operating under the ~ism moniker) and Gordon MacDermid (aka Gump), Carnivalesque, is billed as an album of head-nodding melodic electronic music. And, prosaic though the description may be, that’s what you get. Carnivalesque has no great individual character, truth be told, but is possessed of no little energy, a lyrical lilt, and a pleasantly ludic spirit. This first CD release on promising UK label Herb comes emitting tell-tale traces of its conceivers’ discerning record collection. Starting with the last decade’s IDM-inclined sound of BoC, Plaid, and Christ., going back to early 90s ambient techno of Aphex, Ae, and B12, and then another 15 years to further echoes of the first wave of 70s e-music of Tangerine Dream and Cluster.
Opener “Vertical Hold” reels out heavily chorused acoustic stringed-things, cascading and rippling in interweaving strata over a crisply percussive drum pattern, bringing to mind kindred spirits on Four Tet’s Rounds. Stirring and swirling synth swathes pull the listener through the busily propulsive “Breaking Into Smile,” which shows a distinct affinity with the fusion electronix of n5MD acts like Run_Return and SubtractiveLAD. Rubens marshall a pleasing palette of sound to choreograph the slow-burning electro-balladry of “Giraffe” with its rippling pianoid sonorities, staying elegiac and rightside of grandiosity. “Bank Holiday” is a busy sequencer-led electro-motorer that effectively pushes the dance/electro-rock buttons once more. It’s on centrepiece “Ferris Wheel” that the overall starts to flag. Drawn out to an interminable 10:13, it’s no doubt intended as a modernist update of the stirring Celtic anthem, cf. 80’s variants perpetrated by the likes of synth-pop electro-dance epicists Simple Minds and stadium rock guitar-bagpipers Big Country. But what starts out as a pleasant downtempo lilt soars for a while only to slowly congeal into a treacly morass of keyboard glaze and shortbread biscuit-tin hum-drumming, channeling a theme that will no doubt find its natural home as a Caledonian Airlines boarding backdrop. After these first twenty minutes, the impression sets in of a sound stage suffocated with sonic stodge, crying out for an injection of variation, of both timbre and arrangement.
Flanagan and MacDermid would do well to learn the merits of minimalism – how withholding elements can serve to achieve greater effect rather than pursuing the safe strategy of layering of textures. So, here, alas, is where it flags, the duo’s relative inexperience finding them out, with an emerging air of reprises and retoolings of earlier themes and sequences. Sky-high mile-wide analogue synthetics and busy-bodying beats prevail, with only the noir downtempo trip-hoppery of “Blue Belles Burn Slowly” to provide relief. “Winter Broth” and its pummelling anthemics almost manages to re-rouse the listener, but it’s too late in the day, and it remains to observe that, for a full-length album, Carnivalesque makes a good mini-album.
Carnivalesque is out now on Herb. [Purchase]
