What The Critics Are Saying, Babel Fish Version

(from les inrockuptibles)


The most generous discs are those which invite to be discovered from the start, to give up any form of dignity, to demolish certainty which one accumulated with the wire of time. It is a privilege to enter naked and light a work, and it is with this rare honor that The Afterlife invites, the new album of the New Yorkean duet Elysian Fields. Admittedly, it is not the first time that one finds oneself in the simplest apparatus vis-a-vis the housewife, delicious Jennifer Charles: by the only intermediary of its song, this she-cat with the extreme voice manages to thin out the leaves of the listener to the heart, to transform it into small vulnerable and insane thing of desire. But the experiment still takes a more intense turn with this disc with the poisonous beauty, where the art of the songwriting appears under one day new, magnifié by a filtered lighting which raises the charms of them.

Within a felted and acoustic framework (piano, coppers, cords) where the guitar always inspired of Oren Bloedow plays itself the cat-like graces, Elysian Fields ingénie to scramble the melody and harmonic tracks, to mislead our waitings with mischievousness and elegance, to gum the dividing lines between rock'n'roll of room, jazz, traditional or worked. Symbol bursting of a New Yorkean spirit which did not finish defending the release of musical manners, The Afterlife is a kind of Philosophy in the sound boudoir, whose each measurement is carried to the roof of the intelligence and the sensuality - thus listen to the refrain to fall from Someone, coded it dazing of How We Die or Ashes in Winter Light, not of two vocal coming to complete fabulous final soft inclined. As much to say that one will often return to visit this divine den of iniquity, as one likes to return towards all that makes the life more voluptuous and more unforeseeable.

Oren here....

It's interview season again. The attention can be exciting, but the whole process is riddled with challenges. It's essential to listen well in order to speak well, but sometimes there's very little to listen to. "Tell me how it was, making this record!' 'Why did you call it The Afterlife?' are typical of the thinly-spaced boulders that one must leap between to safely cross the roiling waters of one's own boring private insanity. In an attempt to avoid the kind of self-effacement that comes naturally in these situations, one is too often drawn into a sort of megalomania to realize it only later from the sour aftertaste. And again, in print, if the editing process hasn't spared you.

'Why are you less, or more popular, or successful, here or there, now or then?' "What is it about you that has determined your apparent trajectory or public profile?' These kinds of questions are an invitation to stand as at a bathroom mirror, evaluating yourself and pondering your social life, while the world watches, which is not only embarrassing but impossible, two people can't have one person's private reverie in public. Another difficulty opens up in group interviews, where one person's portrayal of events or conditions battles another. Each member has their own agenda shaping that day's depiction of the emnity, indifference or support of the music industry, the faithfulness and discrimination of the listenership and the integrity of the band in the face of economic pressures.

Sometimes the conversation turns to other artists, and at these moments one interviewee seizes upon this topic with relief, while the other one, hating to squander a rare opportunity, struggles to redirect the subject to the new album. To venture into related culture, history or politics is almost always more congenial but here as well there are dangers, especially in the case of politics, of saying something ignorant or trite that is far below the level of the artist's work. It might as well be admitted, the majority of musical artists, even ones whose work is of real political importance like Bob Marley, are neither thoughtful nor articulate enough at most times to give lectures.

Celebrity forums like the rock interview are prone to this kind of elevation. And there is ample precedent to view mass-media musicians as prophets. As early as the late 18th century, Thomas Paine, in his anti-religious book, the Age of Reason, identified the prophets of the bible with musicians, although in his book, the comparison is not complimentary. Again, this effect is much increased by electronic media. The televangist from Arkansas, a fascist dicator or self-help guru, a singer or rapper, anybody with a stage, lights and a PA system, usurps this role to the degree they are susceptible - and many of us are quite susceptible. It's intoxicating to be applauded for. And just as a drunk rues last night's excesses, it's painful to read one's intoxicated remarks on global warming, international relations, trends in culture and so on in the newspaper the next day.

Still there is the actual work, the artifact, to discuss. Like a castaway on a desert island waits for a low flying seaplane, one waits for the journalist, who, having listened to the CD with a notebook at his elbow, maybe several times, has identified references, themes, recurring motifs... who perhaps is reminded of Mizoguchi, Chekhov or James Ellroy, of Sappho, of Minoan Crete, of Civilization and Its Discontents, Courtly Love or the formula to forge Damascus Steel, who is reminded of childhood or even of this morning's coffee with their estranged love. One waits for a subject that is not demeaning to discuss. One waits for the return of one's own sense of humor, the quickness that sometimes overtakes one from within, the return of the insights that came on last night's after dinner walk in Barcelona, the tenuous links between one's reading on late antiquity, mercantilism and the ages of exploration, colonies and industrialism and today, the sense that there is in fact something to say as an observer of individuals, of nations, of art and intellectual movements and of one's own work in context, something that is neither boring, insignificant or an outright lie. One waits, like a robotic vacuum cleaner that keeps on banging into the same wall, for an opening, so that new vistas can be made clean.

well hello there friends. jennifer here. nothing so comprehensive to be flowing forth at this time, i'm afraid. it is after 1:30 a.m.
and we're in germany. freiburg. in the "lobby" of this very strange hotel. it's hardly a hotel. it's actually a sports complex of some kind. yes, when we come to a town we specify these things, please put us in a sports center! as long as there are sporting games, and lots of them, we want to be there.
so, yes, you can see it has been a long day, and ole jc has gotten a bit punchy. rose at dawn in lisboa, flew to zurich, antoine picked us up there, then drove to freiburg, played the concert, now our rest has been sanctioned to the sports center 15 miles outside town. there is wifi in the lobby so hurray for that. and some minutes ago a blow monkeys song came on the radio! but the real highlight for me was on the drive back here, a beautiful big red fox crossed the road in front of us. nothing like a vulpine creature to get a girl's blood flowing. I wish i could have smelled it. brought to mind a recent read- pelevin's sacred book of the werewolf.
any way, yes, must soon sleep. lisbon was wonderful. will try to give details soon. we were lucky enough to spend four days there.
xo, jennifer

We leave tomorrow for our European tour.
It is after four pm. Have I packed yet?
No. Do I know what I'm bringing? Nope.
It's a beautiful day and I like to make
tea. Stay tuned. First stop Portugal! x