Not Music, the New Stereolab Album Due Out Next Week
Hit This Link To Listen to Not Music In It's Entirety
Stereolab has been my most beloved music band since their 1992 debut album
Peng!. Stereolab's
switched on dense wall of analog synthesizer sound has been widely imitated since, but the band's group's droning, hypnotic rhythm track overlaid with melodic, mesmerizing singsong vocals remains Stereolab's own unique signature sound. The earliest Stereolab albums sounded like those 60s hi-fi test recordings complete with "transient random noise bursts and announcements." Stereolab along with their music peers Massive Attack & Saint Etienne laid the foundation for much of today's post-rock, pop electronica movement in the early 90s.
If you are familiar with well tweaked but organic sound of Stereolab's 2008 release
Chemical Chords then
Not Music will be familiar territory for you. In fact
Not Music was recorded at the same marathon recording session as
Chemical Chords. Don't despair...
Not Music is not outtake content from
Chemical Chords but was originally recorded for a 30 song, double album release of
Chemical Chords which was scaled back to a 14 song single album release.
Not Music is completion of the original 2008 double album version of
Chemical Chords as it was intended to be released. All the songs match up to the high quality of
Chemical Chords which is good news for Stereolab fans. The bad news is that 5 singles from the
Chemical Chords sessions will not be found on
Not Music and will probably be released in the EP format at some unknown future date.
I'm grateful for the release
Not Music and hope Stereolab soon ends their current three year hiatus from recording and performing. I was disappointed in with the music on Laetitia Sadier's much ballyhooed solo album,
The Trip which was released in September. Stereolab has no plans to tour in support of the release of
Not Music. So it will be at least another year before we get a brand new Stereolab album release, but this worthy companion album to
Chemical Chords will make the wait a little easier.
I leave you with the original Stereolab video to their 1993 song
Ping Pong which is one of the most brilliantly ironic pop songs ever written. Laetitia Sadier's revolutionary Marxist lyrics playfully subverts the lilting, "don't worry, be happy" melody of
Ping Ping. It took me awhile to realize that Ms. Sadier's lyrics provided a succinct explanation of the very complicated economic theory of the boom or bust cycles of free market capitalism. Laetitia's childlike, sing song vocal performance which reveals the harsh political realities of capitalism, is in the agit/prop tradition of the musical theater of Bertolt Brecht. Read the lyrics while playing the
Ping Pong video to fully appreciate the irony of the lyrics.
Lyrics to Ping Pong
It's alright 'cos the historical pattern has shown
how the economical cycle tends to revolve
in a round of decades three stages stand out in a loop
a slump and war then peel back to square one and back for more
bigger slump and bigger wars and a smaller recovery
huger slump and greater wars and a shallower recovery
you see the recovery always comes 'round again
there's nothing to worry for things will look after themselves
it's alright recovery always comes 'round again
there's nothing to worry - things can only get better
there's only millions that lose their jobs
and homes and sometimes accents
there's only millions that die in their bloody wars,
it's alright
it's only their lives and the lives of their next of kin
that they are losing
it's only their lives and the lives of their next of kin
that they are losing
it's alright 'cos the historical pattern has shown
how the economical cycle tends to revolve
in a round of decades three stages stand out in a loop
a slump and war then peel back to square one and back for more
bigger slump and bigger wars and a smaller recovery
huger slump and greater wars and a shallower recovery
don't worry be happy things will get better naturally
don't worry shut up sit down go with it and be happy
dum, dum, dum, de dum dum, de duh de duh de dum dum dum... ah ah
dum, dum, dum, de dum dum, de duh de duh de dum dum dum... ah ah