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Future Loop Foundation - Memories From A Fading Room
Good reviews should really be about the thing being reviewed and not the reviewer. Reviewers rattling on about themselves too much is a bit tedious, and lacks imagination. So of course I'm now going to jump headlong into the lack of imagination pool, and immerse me (and unfortunately you) in it whilst being self indulgent and waffling on about myself, and how listening to "Memories from a fading room" has had a strange effect on me.To kick off with, a bit of serendipitous background: apart from being male and having an obvious liking for melodic down tempo electronica the man behind FLF, Mark Barrott and I share a few similarities. He is, like me, from Sheffield, we share the same first name (Ok maybe not such an amazing coincidence), like me he had a musical "road to Damascus" moment when he was a lad watching Kraftwerk in 1981 at Sheffield City Hall and we are roughly around the same age (I say roughly - he is probably younger than me). Why should I mention all of this? Well, the atmosphere that Barrott has created with his latest album makes me feel a nostalgic connection with his music, or rather its direction , than I have rarely if ever felt before about something so obviously new. Maybe its my age? Maybe it's the shared geography? Certainly its FLF's clever and understated production talents.
It has surprised me, this music induced nostalgia feeling, I have generally shunned looking back at stuff with rose coloured glasses, especially music. However, the sound of "Memories from a fading room" is not trying to recapture a musical era from the past. The album doesn't make me feel nostalgic for the noises of my youth, it uses all the sounds and modern production techniques that you would expect in current electronic music and it is firmly from the current post-dance post-rock noughties. The nostalgia it has provoked in me is quite unlike anything else I can recall listening to, its more akin to reading a book or watching a film, like Kes for example. The reaction on hearing the tracks, should be more accurately described as being akin to the fleeting catch of a smell of something that transports you back to another time, another place. Like a certain whiff of a certain kind of food that immediately sends you back to your school dining hall (or refectory as it was grandly called in my school) or the smell of your first crush's perfume that made your stomach cartwheel.
For me this flip back in time is a musical achievement that I think is pretty magical, especially considering the understated nature of it all. Barrott's use of recordings of his Sheffield family from the 70s on are used subtly but to great effect to recreate his past. Here is where the t(his?) past and my past cross paths inside the half light of imagination in a dusty corner in my head. The accents, the characters, the events and the places mentioned in the narrative that weave through the tunes take me back to a distant, half forgotten place. a fading room I suppose.
Samples are taken from: a boy interviewing another boy about subbuteo, cars and his future aspirations; asking his (grand?)parents about the war; their simple wishes, or their favourite flowers; the voice of the speaking clock that as kids we used to phone up thinking it was something super high tech., and old radio show snippets. These sounds all serve to evoke a lost past: the long summer holidays where 6 weeks stretched in a heat haze before you; departed and fondly remembered older relatives; your granddad joking with you; your mum shouting you in for your "tea -bath-bed" ritual on a Sunday night before school next day, as blackbirds sing their beautiful evening song in a neighbours garden.
The album art work and the specially made videos (on the accompanying DVD), cut up and edited from Barrott's cousin's home movies from the seventies (check out FLFs myspace site), heighten the half remembered sense of times lost with their grainy, jumpy and bleached images .
Apologies to anyone under 30 years old, you may not get my review, but don't let that stop you enjoying the music. All this nostalgia may pass you by, and if so you are probably thinking, what does the music sound like? After a few weeks of intense listening I still cant pick out a favourite track they all possess their own charm, this really is an album that requires a listen from beginning to end . Aside from the nostalgia inducing samples, the album touches a few diverse bases. The closing track sounds like something that Vangelis forgot to use in Bladerunner, whilst elsewhere there are echoes of Lemon Jelly, and enough epic moments on tracks like "The Sea and the Sky "and "Sunshine Philosophy" to out do Sigur Ros or The Album Leaf. If you have heard the Cinematic Orchestra's new album and liked it, I reckon "Memories from a fading room" will go down a treat in your headphones. Much of the music on the album marries old and new synth technology with real instruments, also thrown in for good measure is a fair smattering of orchestration, field recordings and "wobbly bits" . The final product is a soundtrack to a ride down your own personal memory lane, but like all great soundtracks, this one stands up all on its own
Set aside 50 minutes or so and see how far the music takes you back, maybe 2 decades or even 3 decades . Alternatively go to The Big Chill , get a copy of the programme, see what time Future Loop Foundation are playing, draw a large circle around their slot time in thick biro, then go see and hear them . After FLF perform I guarantee to will be heading off to the on site music store to get the album.
Soyo/July 2007
Future Loop Foundation play The Sanctuary Stage at The Big Chill 2007, at 21.40.
Big Chill 2007 - who's playing where & when
http://www.myspace.com/futureloopfoundation
http://www.futureloopfoundation.com/
Written: 23rd Jul, 07
Read: 1826 times
