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With 2005’s Multiply, Jamie Lidell created an electronic soul gem, largely free from flab and electro-fumbling. Subsequent live shows were hit and miss; Lidell’s croaky eyed vocals a revelation, but he often fled into expressionless interludes to appease his past work as techno experimenter.
Compass, his third Warp studio album features collaborations with members of Grizzly Bear and Wilco alongside work from Beck and Feist. Having convened in LA for Beck’s Record Club project, sessions continued until Lidell found himself at home in New York with hours of material. Boasting typically impressive production, Compass also contains some of Lidell’s best solo moments.
Early highlight ‘Your Sweet Boom’ recalls Beck in its rickety percussion and sweet guitar licks and ‘She Needs Me’ is a funk inspired love letter with enough teary testosterone to wipe out lesser men. Single and album standout ‘The Ring’ (featuring Grizzly Bears Chilly Gonzalez and Chris Taylor) is a blues-R&B escapade which wouldn’t sound out of place on one of Stevie Wonder’s early 70s masterpieces. ‘You Are Waking’ begins as a sub-Queens of the Stone Age dirge before breaking into scattering drums and prickly melodies, and ‘Compass’ is a sprawling, multi-layered effort that could claim to be Lidell’s career highlight.
It’s not all sweetness and light, ‘I Can Love Again’ and ‘You See My Light’ are forgettable gospel-soul hymns, but there’s enough upbeat experiments (the dark and dingy ‘Coma Chameleon’ stands out) to make Compass a worthy addition to Mr. Lidell’s complex but fascinating musical path. TAGS: Jamie Lidell, Warp Words by: Alistair Beech |
