Way back in the day some said Ui would topple Tortoise as the kings of fake jazz. Tortoise's eggheads were too fragile to withstand Ui's muscular bass slinging, despite they fact that Ui only had three guys. But then Ui turned into robots and all hope was lost (I defy you to listen to The Iron Apple and deny it was composed and performed by machines). And everybody forgot about Ui.
One day I noticed that the LA Weekly was occasionally running articles penned by Sasha Frere-Jones (who is in Ui, in case you don't know). He wrote one about how awesome the Clash were, and I thought maybe there was hope. Then he wrote one about how awesome Destiny's Child was and knew that somewhere underneath the cold circuitry that produced Lifelike (I mean, come on, could it be more obvious?) blood was still warm. The years passed and Answers has finally arrived.
Right off the bat you know its good because this time they decline to list every damned instrument used in recording the album on the cover. When the music starts, however, on the aptly titled album opener "Back Up," you realized how a step back can move everything forward. The machines are gone, and when I say machines, I mean the overwhelming presence of electronics that cooled down everything Ui did after Sidelong, and they are back to the bass, the bass and the drums. Although now they have a fourth member, and so there is also some occasional six string guitar as well. In any case, "Back Up" kicks things off with a hyped up energy level that easily exceeds anything the band has done previously, effectively jump-starting their own too-long dormant circulatory system.
Though Answers is certainly more akin to Sidelong than anything they have done since—its largely a collection of up-tempo songs, driven by the drums as dual bass lines weave their own way along the open space—the music seems to have a new kind of self-confidence, even joyousness, that was previously lacking. Though there was no shortage of humor on Ui's early records, they have always been dogged by a deliberateness, which deadened the fun, like they were thinking about it too hard. The groove feels much more natural, the music more lived-in.
Of note on the new record are the title track, which fills in the usual space between basses with strange drones, queer keyboards and all sorts of effective atmospheric flourishes and culminates in a clatter the likes of which Ui never previously indulged. Also, "Banjo," which is a rather complicated number that replaces what would usually be one of the basses with a, guess what, banjo, and then proceeds to rapidly shift gears between rollicking tunefulness, cacophonous collage, and delicate melody.
Secretly I was hoping for a little treat along the likes of a "Skeletons" or "Sexy Photograph." Given the extraordinary quality of this record, however, the absence of such is not really any kind of fault. In any case, it seems the time off has done Ui some good, making a record as strong as they ever have in the past. Now if they would only tour.
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