Some artists get old and brown and start sprouting little white hairs in unusual places. Others stay fresh. The announcement of two tip-top electronica artist’s new releases – St. Germain’s Real Blues and Moby’s The Light is Clear in Your Eyes put them right in the firm and ripe camp. So to celebrate that, let’s look at a few albums of theirs that are just as juicy today as they were when they came out.
St Germain - Tourist.
When Tourist came out it came from nowhere and really blew minds. To be sure, it’s got crisp, organic sounding production that’s still relevant today, but the real thing it gave to electronica in the 90’s and ever since was a proof of concept: making music with a computer didn’t preclude keeping compositional elements from elsewhere. In this case, the ‘French touch’ Germain pioneered was composed from parts of house music and parts of Nu Jazz. The album is a little left-field, maybe, for current fashion, but it remains a mighty achievement.
Disconcerting album artwork notwithstanding, I’m excited to see that St. Germain’s upcoming release sounds as fresh as ever. Here’s the single:
There’s a difference here to the older stuff: the production techniques are clearly more modern. But what remains is the organic, jazz-influenced arrangement and style. If the single’s anything to go by, St. Germain looks like he’s about to prove that lightning can strike twice.
Moby – Play.
When Eminem rapped that ‘nobody listens to techno’ as a jibe at Moby on 2002’s The Eminem Show, he was wrong in a couple of ways. First: people did and still do listen to techno, and second: in any case Moby never really made techno. Of course, if I had to bet I’d say that Eminem was probably well aware of both things and was looking to bait people like me into saying exactly what I just said.
Nevertheless, the fact that he picked Moby as the target of a jibe like that says something about Moby’s profile around the turn of the century. With the release of Play in 1999 and it’s 2.7 million sales in the US Moby had rocketed to stardom.
You all know this one:
Still a beautiful piece of music, even if that video is a little past its use-by date.
Unlike St. Germain, who has stayed with his leftfield style, Moby has definitely moved with the times. The new single is here:
Can anybody say punk electronica? It rocks, in the genuine sense of rocking out furiously. If I had to judge, I’d say Moby has gotten angrier, rather than mellower, with age. Interestingly, the Void Pacific Choir, who form Moby’s mysterious counterpart on this release, appear to take their name from a quote from the English author D.H. Lawrence: ‘California is a queer place — in a way, it has turned its back on the world, and looks into the void Pacific.’ Make of that what you will.
(Bonus) Massive Attack - Mezzanine
I was trying to find a way to fit this in here seamlessly, and I couldn’t, but to be honest I don’t care and I’m going to talk about it anyway. Of all the electronic albums that have come out in the last twenty years - it blows my fucking mind the most that Massive Attack’s third album Mezzanine is as old as it is. Originally released in ’98, it sounds as fresh and game-changing today as it did then.
Here’s Angel, which I believe you will find if you look in the dictionary under ‘insane banger’:
The difference with these guys is that they haven’t decided to grace with new music this year so far. Here’s one guy with his ear to the ground though, and in the meantime, here’s one of the singles from their most recent studio album, Heligoland:
Fresh as a fruit bowl.
-Jacob Harrison
