Articles
Rafael Anton Irisarri
Slow Six

Albums
Another Electronic Musician
Balmorhea
Celer
City of Satellites
Cylon
Deadbeat
Kyle Bobby Dunn
Eluvium
Ent
Ido Govrin
Danny Paul Grody
Chihei Hatakeyama
Wyndel Hunt
The Internal Tulips
Keepsakes
The Knife
Kshatriy
Lali Puna
Francisco López
Mask
Melodium
Monolake
Clara Moto
Myrmyr
Nos Phillipé
Ontayso
Outputmessage
Pleq
The Q4
Schuster
Shinkei + mise_en_scene
The Sight Below
Sphere Rex
subtractiveLAD
Bjørn Svin
Tamagawa
Ten and Tracer
Trills
Trouble Books
Yellow Swans

Compilations / Mixes
An Taobh Tuathail Vol. III
Does Your Cat Know My...
Emerging Organisms 3
Moment Sound Vol. 1

EPs
Brim Liski
Ceremony
Eric Chenaux
Abe Duque
Hieroglyphic Being
Rafael Anton Irisarri
Manaboo
Monolake
Mr Cooper & Dday One
Pleq & Seque
Nigel Samways
Santos and Woodward
Simon Scott
Soundpool
Stimming, Watt & Biel
Stray Ghost
Ten and Tracer
Stuchka Vkarmanye

Eluvium: Similes
Temporary Residence

On Similes, his follow-up to 2007's Copia, Matthew Cooper (aka Eluvium) makes a rather big gamble in altering the approach that's brought him so much acclaim. Specifically, Similes finds Cooper adding vocals and embracing song structures in place of long-form soundscapes. The vocal move in particular is a bold one, as it can be a deal-breaker between an album succeeding or failing. No worries here: his laconic vocals turn out to be very appealing and a natural complement to the instrumental backings. Not to suggest Cooper modeled his vocal style after Eno, but it's hard to ignore the similarities when the Eluvium delivery recalls so clearly the singing on Before and After Science, the second side in particular, and Another Green World. Like Eno, Cooper's deep voice is often multi-tracked, his delivery relatively deadpan and free of emotional histrionics—the idea being that the songs and melodies already pack enough emotion that no vocal overstatement is needed to get the point across.

A transporting lullaby, “Leaves Eclipse the Light” opens Similes on a mesmerizing note, with a subtly rapturous backing a shimmering complement to Cooper's vocal murmur (lyrically, too, the material evokes Eno's “Everything Merges With the Night” when Cooper at one point sings “…as the day turns into night”). In “The Motion Makes Me Last,” the juxtaposition of deadpan vocal delivery and arresting instrumental touches (a lapping stream of slivers) harks even further back to Taking Tiger Mountain By Strategy. Only on the last song, “Cease to Know,” does Cooper present his voice sans multi-tracking, and consequently the album ends on a fragile note with the voice sounding as much like Lou Reed as it does Eno. Cooper also brings the instrumental density level down a notch or two in the song, which allows his voice more room to breathe. Similes is filled with beautiful moments: the lovely piano theme that graces “The Motion Makes Me Last,” the music's graceful ebb and flow (perhaps most audible during “Cease to Know”), and its hymnal and elegiac tone—familiar characteristics of Eluvium's style that come especially to the fore during the instrumental mini-symphonies that accompany the vocal pieces (the lulling dreamscape “Nightmare 5” and blurry meditation “Bending Dream,” for example).

March 2010