sample:
Hope
Automato's debut album works on two different basic levels. On one
level it's as groovy as a Curtis Mayfield sperm bank, for mother's who desire
designer sprogs with the funk. Automato have the ish to break your pencil tip,
and what's more they could surely make people pick up their mats and dance with
all 11 tracks on this completely divine record.
On a second level their
eponymous debut is a geek's wet dream. Musos everywhere will thrill at the
constructions, the way rhythms are infused with scratching, atmospheric pianos,
funky bass, inconceivably good percussion, oddball guitar, glockenspiels,
cowbells... The basis for most of the tracks are stark, organic hip-hop rhythms,
layered with well thought out instrumentation and production (DFA are at the
desk), and topped off by Jesse Levine's wised up pontificating about the state
of the planet. Contained within are some of the most glorious slacker anthems
we've heard in some time.
"Drive up to Canada just for the cannabis / I'm
just about blow up like the planet is / I don't wanna die I just wanna live, I'm
trying to survive I'm not a communist / I'm no socialist," he tells us on 'My
Casio' before admitting he's lost all faith in politics and frankly no longer
gives a flying one about anything very much at all. "I just wanna drink all
night / forget life and pretend that it's all alright." There's definite
intentional pathos in his disaffection, almost desperation, which he
deliberately disguises with nonchalance.
On 'Cool Boots' we get nearer to
the truth when he humorously discloses: "All I ever wanted was truth, peace,
harmony, and anti-gravitational boots".
The shuffling rhythms from this
New York sextet sound vital, often brutal. Opener 'Focus' is egdy, with a kind
of festival atmosphere to the track. It makes for compulsive listening, and
contains a repetitive guitar line you don't even realise is there until the very
last bar. 'The Single', too, is compulsive in a Beasties 'Check Your Head'-era
kind of way, especially with its off kilter syncopation, and catchy "If it ain't
soul music then it ain't my music" line . The rapper delivers the same lyrics
belatedly just off the tune to make it sound faster, and, well, groovier, giving
it a definite 70s funk shtick. See how it brings out the latent geek?
And
'Walk Into The Light' and 'Hope' are works of stunning ambition that punch their
way out of their genre, then turn around with dukes at the ready, asking for
more. As hypnotic as they are addictive, Automato will leave their peers playing
ketchup for sure.
Jeremy Allen
reviewed on 21 Apr 2004
