AUSTRA: FEEL IT BREAK (2011)
1) Darken Her Horse; 2) Lose
It; 3) The Future; 4) Beat And The Pulse; 5) Spellwork; 6) The Choke; 7) Hate
Crime; 8) The Villain; 9) Shoot The Water; 10) The Noise; 11) The Beast.
Here's even more proof that Canada might truly
be taking the lead in the artistic creativity race in the 21st century. You
might be a fan of Justin Bieber and Carly Rae Jepsen, or you might be more into
Arcade Fire and Godspeed You! Black Emperor, but you're gonna have to serve
somebody... actually, there's a good chance that Toronto-based,
progressively-oriented Katie Stelmanis and her main musical project, Austra,
might appeal, for different reasons, to both audiences. She's into electronics,
she's into strong rhythm, she's into darkness and Freudism, she's into Debussy
and opera, everybody go take your pick.
Artsy synth-pop with stylistically monotonous
arrangements, high-pitched vocalizing, and lyrics that only make sense to the
singer and her personal deity of choice can be a real pain in the ass, if all
of this is not handled properly and is there only to make a point like «I like
music and they told me it only counts if you push forward boundaries, so I'm
pushing like crazy, really I am». In the worst case, you get somebody like Zola
Jesus, to whom Austra's music has frequently been compared (in fact, Austra's
music has frequently been compared to all
female-fronted, dark-overtoned synth-pop ensembles, because Big Brother
demands instantaneous reference points): lots of pretense, lots of stunning
visual images, and no truly interesting music behind it.
But in the best case, you get Austra, or at
least, this, dare I say it, genuinely brilliant debut album from Austra, to
whose brilliancy Austra, like so many other bands out there, will probably
never live up again. The difference? Most people will say Katie Stelmanis'
classically-trained voice, with its impressive range, perfectly held vibrato,
great capacities of modulation, and a strange aura of nervousness and
vulnerability, as if she's either impersonating a human on the verge of being
transformed into a robot, or a robot on the verge of being humanized. There's
great potential here to sound whiny, obnoxious, and irritating, but I sense a
healthy balance between technique, mannerism, and genuine feeling, enough to
earn my sympathy even if most of the time I have no idea what she is singing
about (and neither might she; we can only hope that lines like "I want
your blood, I want it in my hair" and "The morning I saw your face
again, I was made into a beast" are not deeply encoded hints at a criminal
past).
However, it is not Stelmanis' singing that
makes Feel It Break sound really
special. All the tracks are credited to Austra as a band, so we also have to
mention Katie's old colleague Maya Postepski on drums (yes, there are real
drums here, though electronically processed as per regulation) and Dorian Wolf
on bass — yet the melodies are probably Katie's general responsibility as well,
and as much as I am usually wary of synth-pop, there are some truly stellar
parts on here. So many people these days (or any days, actually), when making
electronic-based pop, take out the easy way, relying on simple stock phrasing
with the idea that music should simply provide the groove, while the main
melodic burden will be placed on vocal hooks, that it is nothing less but a
tremendous relief to hear a whole album of tracks where this ideology is
reversed.
Perhaps the best example of this approach is
ʽBeat And The Pulseʼ, a song where the vocals do not even enter in the picture
until the groove, with all of its counterpoints, has become fully established
at about 1:30 into the song. It does not take more than the opening chords to
understand that the author of the track is probably a big fan of Beethoven's
5th, and even though it would take a bit more genius and a tad more equipment
to make an electronic tribute to Beethoven's 5th, ʽBeat And The Pulseʼ succeeds
at a different task — creating a cold, robotic sonic environment that feels
equally influenced by 19th century romanticism and 20th century Kraftwerk. The
way those two «waves» of synthesizer chords wash over each other, and are then
attenuated further by subtle bell toll and dripping ah-ah vocal harmonies,
creates an atmosphere of stern, but soft doom busily spun right before your
very eyes — really great texture here.
Elsewhere, the atmosphere is usually more
sensual and bitter-romantic, but the base principles of work remain the same.
ʽLose Itʼ, the second single, does largely get by on the strength of the vocals
— namely, the unforgettable falsetto vocalizing of the chorus, reflecting
Katie's former training as an opera singer — but the third single, ʽSpellworkʼ,
would have been equally great as a fully instrumental piece: it produces a cool
cavernous sound out of the juxtaposition of the deep rumbling neo-disco bassline
and the crystal-tinkling, water-dripping lead overdubs. But then there are also
such wonderful album-only tracks as ʽThe Futureʼ, which begins with a simple
baroque piano flourish and then takes on a kaleidoscopic look with multiple
small interlocking keyboard and vocal parts; ʽHate Crimeʼ, where the
kaleidoscope turns even more psychedelic by means of adding extra sound effects
like phasing; and ʽShoot The Waterʼ which, with its boppy bouncing rhythmic
structure and fairy wood vocal harmonies, sounds like it could have easily fit
onto Kate Bush's The Dreaming (think
ʽThere Goes A Tennerʼ, but with a darker mood).
With this much creativity going on, there's not
even a good reason to discuss what it is all about. Stelmanis' words generally
feel like they are there simply for allowing her to practice her vocal
gymnastics; if you try to invest too much meaning into all these choruses
("don't wanna sympathize with the darkness!", "shoot the water,
baby, I've been found!", "arise sweet demon and have your say!"),
you might find yourself wondering what the hell you have been doing with your
life one day. There may be a bit of politics here, but mostly it's the same old
me-and-you, with the singer not afraid of a little provocation every once in a
while ("I came so hard in your mouth" is an actual line in ʽThe
Futureʼ) — like sort of a dark reflection of Beach House, with the warm magic
vibe replaced by a cold sorcery one. And even if all the songs share the same
vibe, Katie's diligent attention to the melodic side of the music perfectly
justifies this.
Only on the last track, ʽThe Beastʼ, does she
switch over to a regular piano, and, strangely but perhaps predictably, the
results are not as interesting — the entire piece rests on two chords and, as
such, sounds suspiciously similar to Adele's ʽHometown Gloryʼ. I still accept
it as a suitable gesture of farewell that slips in a little acoustic warmth
next to all the electronic coldness, wrapping things up in style — a style
that, to me, sounds derivative, but still not deprived of its own intriguing
identity. At the very least, as far as 21st century synth-pop goes, Feel It Break has to qualify as a nice,
fresh take on a thirty-year old style; and I'm sure Depeche Mode would love to
have added something as juicily doom-laden as ʽBeat And The Pulseʼ to their own
catalog. Thumbs up, of course.
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