Taking the scaffolding down once you´ve finished doesn´t count as a ground breaking approach in construction circles. But builders don´t do songs, and musical scaffolding generally stays in. I don´t think I´ve often read interviews where someone says, ´We started the song with a bassline that we eventually turfed out.´ Today´s track is an example of doing exactly that, except it´s not a bassline scaffold. So almost exactly that.
Home came out last year on Caribou´s album, Suddenly, a work in which Caribou (aka Dan Snaith) demonstrated an impressive breadth of sonic options; rock, techno, piano house, ambient, UK garage, everything got a look in. Philip Sherbourne did a great review in Pitchfork, tracking Snaith´s song-writing progress, highlighting his wide palette and the novelty with which it was applied, ´There´s nothing generic about even his most exacting genre studies.´ The original of Home was exactly that, a genre study, but one that sought to leap out of the pigeonhole. A splatter of samples, centred on vocals, guitar and brass from Gloria Barnes´ deep soul ballad, Home, created a J-Dilla/Madlib style mashed-up beat framework, but then came a song on top. Snaith´s simple sung melody, dedicated to theme of homecoming, which might have been mistaken for a lightweight spray job at first glance.
Now here come Toro Y Moi, who have removed that sampled framework, and revealed Snaith´s song to be a solid chassis all of its own. Tender but solid. That tenderness is up front now, and the convention that says soul or strumming is the way to show emotion has been upended. What we get instead is dissonant keys, screeching, sirens, half a harp, snippets of primary school at break time, and odd bits of drum clatter. It sounds like a distracted brain grappling with lots of life and one big feeling. Now she´s made her peace with everything. If you want to resist, a blast of sound will bring down your defences.
Toro Y Moi´s mix is from the new(-ish) Suddenly remix album, where there are plenty of other wonders to delve into. Koreless´s mix of Like I Loved You grabbed chunks of my attention first, and now Jessy Lanza´s version of You and I is repeating the trick. If that´s not enough, there are more mixes by reliable faces like Four Tet, Floating Points, Prince Nifty, Logic1000 and, last week´s hero, Morgan Geist.
THIS WEEK
Caribou – Home (Toro Y Moi remix)
9, 058 views since 12th Mar Weekly Average Views – 3,170
LAST WEEK
Marie Davidson & L’Œil Nu - Worst Comes To Worst (Morgan Geist Remix)
Weekly Average Views – 654 Blog Week Views – 206
EXTRAS Caribou – Home
Caribou – Never Come Back (Koreless Remix)
Caribou – You And I (Jessy Lanza Remix)