Funky but weak
IS there really another Gorillaz album out? We were actually still trying to digest last year’s overstuffed Humanz. And shouldn’t we be wary of a new release so close to that 26-song project? After spending time with The
Now Now, the answer is yes – yes, indeed. The 11-track collection includes some of Gorillaz’s funkiest riffs and also some of the weakest tunes in the band’s catalogue.
The Now Now has basically two speeds – up-tempo, synth-washed EDM and maudlin, half-thoughtout ballads. The band’s signature approach – dizzying levels of collaboration with cool guests – isn’t present here. Other than George Benson, Jamie Principle and Snoop Dogg, the Rolodex is thin.
That thinness isn’t apparent with the album opener, Humility, a blissed-out summer jam enlivened by Benson’s funky guitar work. Snoop Dogg also returns to Gorillaz for a terrifically slinky portrait of Hollywood. And on the high-tempo Sorcererz, lead singer Damon Albarn’s vocal effects make him sound like an old blues legend. Another standout is the mostly instrumental Lake Zurich ,a disco throwback with some of the best cowbell ever recorded in this century. Seriously.
But it’s not clear what the poor state of Idaho did to deserve Idaho, a turgid, overwrought mess. Kansas seems like it was written in 10 minutes while absentmindedly waiting for a bus, and Fire Flies manages to be both clumsy and bland. One Percent is virtually unlistenable while Magic City is lazy and reveals the limits of Albarn’s natural voice.
Gorillaz manages to right this sinking ship by the last song, Souk Eye, which melds a good beat and interesting sonic textures with smoky vocals. Nice, but it’s too late for a messy album. (Albarn seems to concede this notion, singing at one point, “Everything that follows, I’m not responsible for.”)
The Now Now will test even diehard fans and reveal that the endless gimmickry from the so-called world’s first virtual band can eventually grate. – Mark Kennedy/AP HIGH As Hope could be seen as Florence Welch’s quarter-life crisis album.
The Florence + the Machine frontwoman has had some ups and downs in the decade since breaking out in 2009 with the debut album Lungs. There have been three UK chart-topping albums and an acclaimed headlining set at Glastonbury, but also detours into drink and self-doubt.
On High As Hope, Welch picks over the traces of her sometimes misspent youth and looks ahead with tentative hope. Lyrically, it’s a delight: reflective, wry and rueful. Musically, it retains the extravagance Welch’s fans love: big hooks embedded in a wall of sound.
Produced chiefly by Welch and Emile Haynie, with contributions from musicians including Sampha, Jamie xx and Tobias Jesso Jr., High As Hope cushions Welch’s raw and soaring vocals on a lush bed sound – keyboards, strings, drums, handclaps, the works.
There’s oodles of operatic drama, but the album’s biggest pleasures often come in subtle moments. Opening track June begins with a sigh, before swelling in a swirl of strings to an exhortation: “Hold on to each other.”
Sky Full Of Song, released as a single, pares back the musical shrubbery and lets Welch’s voice convey regret and elation, as she sings “Grab me by the ankles, I’ve been flying for too long.”
The quest for connection with others is a recurring theme. On Hunger, another single, Welch alludes to an eating disorder – “At 17, I started to starve myself” – and recounts attempts to banish loneliness with drugs, art and love. The angst is offset by an anthemic chorus.
South London Forever is similarly acute, a bittersweet trip down a pub-filled memory lane.
The album ends on a gentle, ambivalent note with No Choir, which suggests Welch has found a measure of peace – for better or worse. “It’s hard to write about being happy,” she sings. “Happiness is an extremely uneventful subject.”