Low Res
Approximate Love Boat
[Plug Research]
Rating: 8.3
Whenever I'm seized by the urge to slaughter Jamiroquai, I reach for the
settling sounds of Danny Zelonky. His music rings with strange twitterings,
bizarre chords, and lysergic harmonies. Quite the thing to keep me from
homicide, however justifiable.
Zelonky's Low Res project has a tale to tell. He explains that an
alien race, the Lomaxians, has located the exact point of origin
of the lone coherent signal in the vastness of the cosmos. Lomaxian
engineers distilled the image and three cryptic words appeared on their
monitors: "The Love Boat." Having concluded that this image was not a
random event, but premeditated, the Lomaxians resolved to end decades of
speculation and send a team of eggheads and musicologists to the source
of this mystifying signal. The extra- terrestrial physicists calculated
that the journey to the source would take a third of any Lomaxian's
lifespan, but despite that fact, the opinion of the government was that
whatever the expedition discovered would be invaluable.
Many years after setting out, the pioneers reported back that they had
begun the return voyage and that they had recorded the entire musical
output of the Love Boat Planet. Everyone back on the home world was
thrilled and beside themselves with anticipation.
Disaster Strikes! At the halfway point between their home planet and
Earth, a devastating error occured in the Lomaxian computer network,
corrupting all of data collected. Since going back to the Love Boat
Planet was out of the question (remember, each Lomaxian was already over
halfway through his or her lifespan), the musicologists had only one
option: fraud. From memory, they set out to recreate the spellbinding
music they heard and gathered. Unfortunately, the only instruments they
had available to them were the machines onboard their starship. Now they
can only hope to be able to convince their superiors that the music they've
crudely approximated is really the music of the Love Boat Planet.
And this is what they came up with: Imagine Oval or Microstoria cast
adrift in the infinity of the universe. Imagine you've been adrift for
so long you can't even remember what a melody is, only that you can string
together intonations that skim the surface of harmony, like a slim stone
bouncing off the crests of waves before plummeting to the deep ocean.
"Evanesce" starts out as remote and as cold as the intergalatic wastes;
but soon the track changes and becomes turbulent as it passes through
stellar matter. "Drat" sounds like an immensely attenuated shortwave
radio broadcast of a light classical station that was disrupted while
passed through a nebula or two. "Kilter" is a Lomaxian interpretation of
cocktail jazz, except the gizmo they used to lay down the comping chords
is an integral component of their starship's food replicator. The
musicologists also sought to introduce their species to hip-hop beats
on this track, too.
Extremely thorough in their field recordings, the Lomaxians even
catalogued the enticing musical sounds of an ice cream truck. "Sinister
Ice Cream Truck" is no misnomer; I, personally, would be a little leery
of buying Nutty Buddies, Jumbo Jet Stars and Bomb Pops from that particular
van. "Wag" will at least introduce the aliens to the concept of tech-house;
whereas the loamy "Field Holler" will leave them convinced that humans not
only enjoyed sitting around and watching crap TV, but also loved to listen
to viscous music.
Perhaps you're perceptive and suspecting Zelonky of satire. Can it be
a coincidence that the name of the alien race that engages upon this
field- recording mission bears a stunning similarity to the folk
musicologist and song hunter, Alan Lomax? (Incedentally, after some time
spent with the record, it appears that Zelonky is only making a slight dig.)
The spellbinding "Approximate Love Boat" signifies a high watermark for
U.S. electronica, in contrast to the all- too- typical gruel of in- jokes
and half- baked beats that DJ Wally and his sort cook up. Safe to report,
then, that my urge to slaughter has been quelled. For the time being...
-Paul Cooper