Thought some of you here may dig this sneak review by a dear friend,
Aaron Schultz (DRM of Bastard Jazz Records) who has an advance copy of
the new Thievery album. Release date is 9.17.02.
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I was lucky enough to get an advance copy of the new
Thievery Corporation album "The Richest Man in
Babylon" from ESL today.
I just took a listen to it, and I have to admit - I'm
really, really impressed. Keep in mind I've only
listened to it once, but here goes:
On one hand, it seems like Thievery has really
returned to their "Sounds from the Thievery Hi-Fi"
roots sound. "The Mirror Conspiracy" had a lot of more
uptempo, bossa-ish tracks, whereas this album really
has a lot of hard hitting hip-hop breaks and dub
basslines, bongos,congas, and tablas, sampled +
delayed ragga vocals or actual vocalists (Notch, from
Born Jamericans is on it, as well as Sleepy Wonder and
Shinehead) layered in with a lot of Middle Eastern,
Persian, and Indian sounds ..thats the Thievery sound
I love so much.
There's a fair deal of quality female vocals on the
record (most of the female vocal tracks are just
straight downtempo joints though, with heavy drum
breaks...)..Emiliana Torrini is on two tracks, Pamela
Bricker (who sung on "Lebaneese Blonde") sings on two
tracks. LouLou (sung on "Le Monde" and "Shadows of
Ourselves") sings on one track in Farsi and another in
French.
This is really a refreshing album to listen to. This
is the album Thievery should have made to follow up
"Sounds from The Thievery Hi-Fi". Their programming
has vastly improved and they don't seem to be reliant
on the same loops and breaks like they have been known
to do. The blending of unique ethnic flavors on this
record is incredibly tasteful and smooth - I can
honestly say that I would play 95% of these tracks out
in a DJ set, and on top of that, 90% of the songs you
can beatmatch into a downtempo set, which is much more
than I can say for "The Mirror Conspiracy", which
always found itself unused in my record crate.
You can player hate and talk about 'commercialism' all
you want, but there is a reason that these guys are as
big as they are in the downtempo world - and "The
Richest Man in Babylon" truly solidifies that.
Here's a tracklisting and ESL's little description of
each track.
01 - "Heaven's Gonna Burn Our Eyes"
While in Washington D.C., Icelandic Singer Emiliana
Torrini met Thievery Corp. at the 18th St. Lounge.
Based upon a late night impromptu session, Garza and
Hilton asked Emiliana to contribute her beautiful,
hypnotic, voice to these two tracks.
02- "Facing East"
Featuring Vocals by Pamela Bricker who's unmistakeable
voice is known on the classic Thievery track "Lebanese
Blonde"
03- "The Outernationalist"
Revisiting "Sounds from the Thievery Hi-Fi", this
track draws heavily on the duos reverence for Jamaican
music.
04- "Interlude"
Developed one afternoon while talking to an Afghani
friend.
05- "Omid (hope)"
Features LouLou, our favorite Persian chanteuse. To
our knowledge, this may be the only electronic music
cut in Farsi
06- "All That We Perceive"
Features Pamela Bricker on vocals and some nice guitar
work by our friend Chris Vrenios. The horns were
played by Rick Harris.
07-"Un Simple Histoire"
Sung by LouLou, a slice of French prose juxtaposed
with Persian and Indian instrumentation
08- "Mue Destino"
With vocals by Cape Verdian singer Patrick Dos Santos,
this bossa nova song finds Thievery delving into
brazillian sounds.
09 - "Exilo"
Discovered in Rob Garza's haunt, Rhumba Cafe, Vernie
Verela was asked to grace the LP with an Afro-Cuban
number. The result is this haunting track
10 - "From Creation"
More classic Thievery Corporation sounds ala "Sounds
from the Thievery Hi Fi"
11 - "The Richest Man in Babylon"
Our Anthem, penned by Rob Garza and painstakingly
recorded in the winter of 2001. For us, this song says
it all. The incredible vocals by Notch, of born
Jamericans fame.
12- "Liberation Front"
After many evenings listening to ESL resident Farid
spin afrobeat records from Nigeria, we cut a
particularly good session with horn player Rick Harris
and guitars from Desmond Williams.
13 - "The State of the Union"
Sleepy Wonder and Shinehead give us the real state of
the union address. (SIDE NOTE: this track is really
the shit..this is like the "Assault on Babylon" style
track of the album)
14 - "Until the Morning"
Icelandic soul from Emiliana Torrini
15- "Resolution"
This was the first song recorded for the album, and we
always knew it would end it as well.
There you have it :) Just my 2cents.
-Aaron
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