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AIR
AIR
AIR
AIR
Since
their humble beginnings on Premiers
Symptomes, their 1997 debut E.P., French
electropop duo Air have done everything in their means to bring a French
flavor of spacey electronic pop into the mainstream… and based on recent hits
like “thank u, next” and “bad guy” I’d say they have achieved their goal. Air’s
debut, 1998’s Moon Safari, is a pop classic
of instrumental-space-pop-retro-futurism. This French duo single-handedly
helped downtempo move from the basements of ravers to more respects venues like
Hôtel Costes. That “Chill-out Mix” you just download? Most
likely has Air on it. What do you want? Feathery guitars? Piano solos? Ribbons
of synthesizer? Deep reverb? Plush arrangements? Bongos!? Air has got it! Air
like to let you know what kind of album you're in for with the first couple of
bars of their opening tracks. Moon Safari faded up with bongos
on "La Femme D'Argent", setting the stage for a loose and hep journey
into space-age atmospherics. The "do-do-thWACK" S&M whip of the
drum machine opening to "Electronic Performers", on the other hand,
thrust us into the stiffer, shinier, more adventurous world of 10,000
Hz Legend, wherein Nicolas Godin and Jean-Benoît Dunckel sounded as if
they'd been inhaling some of Dean and Gene Ween's Scotchgard. Talkie
Walkie broke the percussion-only trend by pairing its opening beat
with a strummed acoustic guitar and a stately piano refrain, introducing their
warmest, brightest, and most song-oriented album. Stomping piano and opiated
gospel handclaps march on album highlight "Venus" set a brutal
funereal pace through keyboards that break like dead, pale winter sunlight and
falling ice. Tolling bells and crickets take the song into twilight. Somehow
it's numbingly romantic. Atonal music boxes, Plutonian pings, and digital
fugues created an album that evokes purgatorial drifting, running out of
oxygen, and passing into the light after a Space Walk disaster. On Pocket
Symphony, the opening message is equally clear: The fluttering percussion
on "Space Maker", hovering all alone, sounds like it's bouncing off
hard, cold surfaces. And since Air have always been pop
songwriters more than any kind of "electronic" act, they manage to
offer a terrific picture of the music that informs their own recordings. There is
nothing I love more than sitting down and just putting on an album and getting
a full experience. Dark Side… In Rainbows… Soft Bulletin… each of Air’s album
is a journey and a sincere experience.to the album now is nothing but a sincere
experience. This band can progress through prog and funk and connect it all so
beautifully and to realize this is music created by a couple of music nerds
with a knack for grand, symphonic statements make the music that much
enjoyable. Air is what we need to stay alive, in our retro-futuristic dreams.
Air consists of Jean-Bénoit Dunckel and Nicolas Godin. do love their cheeses
and their well-tailored suits, they're hardly stereotypical snobs. In person,
the duo are reserved and shy while still retaining a sense of congenial
warmth.
The pair (both entering their 50’s) have known each other for
over 30 years, and they abide by a personal-- perhaps-unconscious—wavelength.
And the wide variety of sounds they've embraced throughout their catalog-- from
the slow-burn chillout of Moon
Safari to 10,000 Hz Legend's weirdo space-rock to the faint
teenage glow of The Virgin Suicides soundtrack to Pocket
Symphony's rock-garden minimalism to all the rest suggest Air
have done a lot of traveling in their days, sonically and otherwise. And when
you travel as consistently and long as this band… you know the one thing you
can’t live without is… that one thing...
Air
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