Sybarite - Nonument
(4AD)
Like Steve Reich conducting the Penguin Café Orchestra ("Secropia") or Vini Reilly leading Tortoise, former Silver Apples drummer Xian (pronounced like "Christian") Hawkins' fourth full length release is a cool, jazzy cocktail that will please lounge lizards and space age bachelors everywhere. The typically enigmatic Vaughan Oliver/v23 packaging that adorns most 4AD releases is a bit cumbersome and overwhelming, but perfectly suited for the antiseptic electronics within. The precise, Kraftwerk-ian sound collage that is "Renzo Piano" sounds like one of those old Carl Stalling/Raymond Scott assembly line sound tracks accompanying a Warner Brothers cartoon, while "Water," (one of three tracks with vocals) has a syncopated dancebeat that's about as easy to dance to as vintage Talking Heads or Residents—imagine David Byrne with a nervous twitch dancing with himself, or The Residents playing space age bachelor pad music.
Being born on Leap Day, "Leap Year" had a promising fascination for me, but it's basically a stuttering, syncopated New Order retread, and while Brooke Williams has a pleasant enough voice ("The Fourth Day" and "Fresh Kills") that might normally add a little warmth to the proceedings, Xian's metallic universe and scratchy, wax-cylinder sound FX robs her tracks of all emotion. "Three Sided" ends matters on a down note, like cascading waterfalls on one of those newfangled Yuppie contraptions designed to soothe and scintillate. Too disjointed to be Easy Listening music, yet somehow too alluring to be elevator Muzak, Hawkins' metallic TKO is as soothing as knockout drops. Quirky...edgy...robotic. It's like trying to fall asleep after downing a pot of espresso—your body is willing, but your nerves are too shattered to relax.
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