Her Space Holiday - Manic Expressive
(Tiger Style)
Marc Bianchi's buttocks must be so soft and kissable. At least I can't justify the frequency of them being kissed by the music press any other way. After hearing glowing praise for their previous album Home is Where You Hang Yourself I decided to check it out, and after doing so was totally overwhelmed with complete ambivalence. This, however, was not enough to dissuade me, and I still had it in my heart to give them other chances.
The next chance came when I received a copy of Manic Expressive, and after looking at its nearly perfect cover/packaging (easily the best of last year) I thought to myself "this is going to be the best thing ever." It wasn't. It started off with a "robot voice" welcoming me to the album which while, apparently, was meant to be amusingly charming, was only marginally annoying. Next came "Lydia" which is a really good (if not great) song. It is also fairly characteristic of the rest of the album, a foundation of new wave, accented by more up-to-date electronic beats and textures, male and female vocals, and occasional other instrumentation. Not a bad template, but it is used with inconsistent results. For example, the good song "Lydia" is followed by "The Ringing In My Ears" which begins at least as good or even better but soon sours. The male/female vocals are very nice, the beats are unique, but not distracting, the keyboards complement each other, with a base of atmospheric sounds, accented by a bell-like melody, strings, and guitar. The problem arises, however, towards the end of the song, where there is a woodwind solo of some kind that was, apparently, sampled from a Kenny G Christmas album. The rest of the tracks are all fairly similar, and some are even quite good, but more are just okay.
Even after experiences with Her Space Holiday which can be called nothing more than disappointing, there is still something inside of me that wants to like them. The concept of the band is a really good one, and there are hints of something remarkable throughout both albums. In spite of these sporadic moments of brilliance, sadly, I am still left wondering what all the fuss is about. The next chance I'm giving them will be coming up towards the end of February when I plan to see them play live. I'm really hoping that they can help me understand.
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