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 Caught in the Carousel - Music Reviews and More
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Dean and Britta
Back Numbers
Zoe Records
After the demise of the implausibly undervalued Luna, Dean Wareham and Britta Phillips have come to record a delectable, iridescent collection of hip and bubbly pop songs (this being their sophomore effort as a duo, having released an l.p. just prior to Luna's disbandment). The entire record is suffused with an infectious, ineradicable sense of exuberance that summons the ghosts of Lee Hazlewood, Francoise Hardy, Serge Gainsbourg, Stereolab, Air, and Wareham's long-deceased Galaxie 500. In effect, the atmosphere could be defined (ostensibly) as European--despite the language in which they sing, the bright, effervescing feel of the record brings to mind the pops and hues which swaddle the body of Anna Karina in Godard’s "Une Femme est une Femme,”--I find it nearly impossible to shake my mind of this image when listening. The textures and compositions are alternately concise and expansive, as most songs employ a small array of instruments and sounds to cement their landscapes. A variety of instruments are utilized like the standard guitar/drum/bass and vocal, but there's also violins, vibes and synthesizers; this is probably the most consciously electronic effort by Wareham yet. Despite its arsenal, the compositions are fairly minimal, resulting in a tremendous depth--the record is full of spaces to savor, to wade and swim lithesomely through.
The songs themselves are a particularly varied lot, a delightful selection of dream and lounge pop confections which seem to swirl vertiginously about the head, which peel back the feathered rind and derma, and burrow under your skin with furtive little claws. "Wait for Me" should be some kind of post-adolescent torch song, an anthemic but quiet doo-wop number which warms the wrungs of my respiratory system; "The Sun is Still Sunny" is as comforting and empathetic as pop music can possibly get. My favorite, however, would have to be the Lee Hazlewood cover, "You Turned My Head Around," which sounds like a voluptuous chanteuse and émigré onstage with an old Nashville bar band, the frayed and forlorn threads of a flag lamely swinging above them.
An altogether joyous procession, exhaustively endorsed.
--Brandon DiSabatino
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