Rating: 4/5
Tom Rowlands and Ed Simons occupy a place of honour in the museum of electronic dance music.
Alongside acts like Fatboy Slim and The Prodigy, The Chemical Brothers defined the rave scene of Europe in the ’90s. Their kaleidoscopic music saw big beats and druggy, euphoric pop hooks looped into infinity. This hypnotic sound tapped into something very primal in people, inspiring them to dance, fuck and do copious amounts of pingers (not necessarily in that order). Whether you argue this is fine art or merely ugly hedonism, The Chemical Brothers were a force of nature.
After a decade of negligible musical activity, The Chemical Brothers have dusted themselves off and entered the electronic arena once more. New album, Born in the Echoes, is the eighth full-length from the dance veterans. One can’t help but ponder exactly what world it is The Chems have stepped back into. Since their 1999 magnum opus, Surrender, electronic dance music has shifted and fractured more times than can be counted. We’ve watched rave, dubstep, and drum and bass all have their moment and fizzle out. The iPod has made listening to music less of a communal activity and more of a personal one. With the internet, we’ve seen the gatekeeping powers of major music labels seriously undermined. Many dance producers have either descended into self-parody or done a Daft Punk and fled back to the 1970s.
In such a profoundly changed landscape, does The Chemical Brothers’ music still work?
The answer, surprisingly, is yes. Born in the Echoes is an album of bass-heavy, pulse-quickening, old-school electronica, with just enough innovation to keep it from feeling antiquated. Though lacking the wild creativity of their early works, Echoes actually benefits from its sanded edges and focused nature. Don’t let the crude artwork fool you; Echoes is slick, streamlined and precise. The chord progressions and structure of tracks like opener “Sometimes I Feel So Deserted” could be seen as predictable, or instead as artisan producers delivering the goods efficiently and straight to the vein.
But fear not, lovers of weirdness. Even relatively unadventurous songs, such as “I’ll See You There” or the aforementioned opener, have peculiar textures woven into them. And with each guest vocal spot on the album, comes the unique flavour of that singer’s voice. “Under Neon Lights” features the stunning voice of St. Vincent soaring over busy arpeggios and squelching bass. Q-Tip lends his rhymes to “Go”, a neon anthem that wouldn’t have been out of place on Daft Punk’s Discovery. The only collaboration that isn’t a winning formula is unremarkable closer “Wide Open”, featuring a phoned-in performance by indie icon, Beck. His spot mightn’t have been as disappointing had he not delivered the best vocals of his career as recently as last year on his album Morning Phase.
By any logic, Born in the Echoes shouldn’t be as good as it is. Somehow, The Chemical Brothers have made an album that is nostalgic but doesn’t feel dated or obsolete. Even without the fury of their live show or the caustic psychedelia of their early works, they are still able to wrestle genuine excitement out of the listener. You don’t even need to be off your tits on MDMA to get behind these tunes.
Echoes doesn’t just match the achievements of modern dance producers; it arguably surpasses them.
