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On the Shelf 088: Atoms for Peace
May. 1st, 2013 09:08 pmI mentioned it in passing and you probably already know, but Thom Yorke and Flea (and nigel Goodrich and Joey Waronker, drummer for Beck and post-Bill Berry REM and Brazilian instrumentalist Mauro Refosco (who has worked with Steve Earle, David Byrne and the Chili peppers) are Atoms for Peace and have an album out AMOK.
That pretty much establishes it as a must listen right there.
With a lineup of this magnitude, one immediately thinks of Damon Albarn and his various projects.
Don't. This is very much Yorke's show, and it it actually isn't (credits are shared), it at least feels like Yorke's show. If this was Albarn, maybe this album would reflect the funk pedigree of the Chili Peppers or explore the rhythms that Refosco displays in his band Forro in the Dark.
This feels like a follow-up to The Eraser. You might think of that as a bad thing, but I think Eraser is one of the most underrated albums of the last decade. I consider it on par with Radiohead's work and think highly of it.
Yorke has said AMOK would have been an instrumental album except if it was then it would have disappeared without a trace (a claim which I won't dispute. No one would have got excited without at least some presence of York's vocals).
Reviews for AMOK are through the roof. AV Club gave it an A-, Uncut a 9 out of 10 and 4 stars out of 5 from the venerable Allmusic.
I am not willing to go that far, but it is a good album. If you're a Yorke fan, no doubt you will enjoy it. Depending on your tastes, some people may really enjoy the ambient sounds (maybe even more than a typical Radiohead album), although I would have been happier with songs that left stronger impressions in the end; and although this is not the genre-jumping album that the group's members suggest, there is no doubt that the musicians are more than able to bring the beat.
Good album. Really good album. Think I will dig out The Eraser again.
That pretty much establishes it as a must listen right there.
With a lineup of this magnitude, one immediately thinks of Damon Albarn and his various projects.
Don't. This is very much Yorke's show, and it it actually isn't (credits are shared), it at least feels like Yorke's show. If this was Albarn, maybe this album would reflect the funk pedigree of the Chili Peppers or explore the rhythms that Refosco displays in his band Forro in the Dark.
This feels like a follow-up to The Eraser. You might think of that as a bad thing, but I think Eraser is one of the most underrated albums of the last decade. I consider it on par with Radiohead's work and think highly of it.
Yorke has said AMOK would have been an instrumental album except if it was then it would have disappeared without a trace (a claim which I won't dispute. No one would have got excited without at least some presence of York's vocals).
Reviews for AMOK are through the roof. AV Club gave it an A-, Uncut a 9 out of 10 and 4 stars out of 5 from the venerable Allmusic.
I am not willing to go that far, but it is a good album. If you're a Yorke fan, no doubt you will enjoy it. Depending on your tastes, some people may really enjoy the ambient sounds (maybe even more than a typical Radiohead album), although I would have been happier with songs that left stronger impressions in the end; and although this is not the genre-jumping album that the group's members suggest, there is no doubt that the musicians are more than able to bring the beat.
Good album. Really good album. Think I will dig out The Eraser again.
