“…nous fait chavirer avec un corps instrumental terriblement bien maîtrisé…voix chaude et atmosphérique nous glisse des images fabuleusement troublantes…”–Modesti, WTFRU
English translation: “…tiger paw capsized us with a body of terribly well-mastered instruments…warm and atmospheric voice slips us fabulously disturbing images…”
Sometimes artists come together although they have different musical worlds at the start. This type of alliance can create a feeling of surprise that would be successively followed by a nameless relief. We can say fairly safely that AM & Shawn Lee have created this kind of sentimental upheaval within us. The musician AM, having already recorded with Air among others, has always known how to choose his partners. This explains why after hearing Shawn Lee’s Music and Light, AM couldn’t pass up this potential partnership, which promised wonders. AM pushed things a little and succeeded in contacting Shawn Lee via MySpace. The two partners quickly found common tastes: the psychedelic sounds of the 60s as well as Italian film soundtracks from the 70s and 80s. This is, we digress to say that it seems another well-known duo of our little French ears is as fond of this kind of background. A clue? Think about guys who have had legendary status for a while, falling into the abyss later with a more than mediocre album…
In short, fortunately this is not the case of these two fellows who sign an amazing album with ESL and Naïve Records. This achievement is a product of our digital generation and you will understand why. Like numerous artists at the moment, AM & Shawn Lee have rarely come together physically to create musically. One living in the United States and the other in England, it is thanks to the web that this album could be conceived. Shawn Lee created, on his side, a musical database by sending it to the devoted AM who hurried to add his voice and some other instruments. The first metaphor that comes to mind is of course that of musical ping-pong and judging by the level of our players this could only result in a very beautiful match. Let’s analyze, a little more prepared, the highlights of this match.
First is City Boy which opens hostilities. Funky, groovy, so many terms to define this first piece which leads us into the fabulous world of these majestic entities that are AM and Shawn Lee.
In stride, Lonely Life follows it and its admirably high-voltage synths accompanied by AM’s smooth voice. An alternative flight beginning above the Manhattan skyscrapers and finishing in a kind of Camden Rainbow Tunnel, fresh and sweet waves without end.
Then Dark Into Light, the album’s hit, appears suddenly in a frenetic manner. A piece that comes very close to the soundtrack of Drive. One rational justification of this comment is none other than the use of synth bass tones which reminds us of the work of Desire or that of the group Valerie and Friends.
Somebody Like You is the melodic blues transcending the effects of Reverb and Tremolo that descend from the car. We are dealing with a majestic plurality of genres from different eras, switching from 60s psyche-synth to 90s post-pop-rock guitar sounds with disconcerting simplicity.
We initially and logically raise our hat to Shawn Lee, whose tiger paw capsized us with a body of terribly well-mastered instruments, but equally to AM who with his warm and atmospheric voice slips us fabulously disturbing images during the 43 minutes. The masters often stay the same, and to evict these two, we wish lots of courage to the rising alternative indie-pop stars whose troubles are far from over.
