 |
|
Alexander Hacke, "Sanctuary"
Alexander Hacke's new solo album Sanctuary bears some of the hallmarks of Einstürzende Neubauten's last album Perpetuum Mobile, an album that documented the concept of travel in a very tight and streamlined way. Unlike Perpetuum Mobile,Hacke uses a myriad of styles and tempos which make it difficult tolisten to at first.
Koolarrow
Repeated listenings reveal that the album's lack ofcontinuity is its strong point. It is like a series of audio postcardsfrom Hacke, each one giving a flavor of where he is. The album wasrecorded by Hacke during his travels and an army of guest artists(including J.G. Thirlwell, Andrew Chudy, David Yow and CasparBrötzmann) and the results were assembled into Sanctuary. Thereis no particular style that is common to every track, each one is itsown little microcosm. "Sister" is a mix of swirling guitars surging upduring breaks in the vocal sample taken from a women's self defencetutorial. This is the first point on the album that really captivatedme. The relaxed "Love me love my dog" is a massive shift of pace after"Sister," at this point I found myself being lulled into a cosysanctuary of my own. The title track and "Seven" are where Hacke getsto use all those guitar riffs that don't fit into Neubauten'srepertoire. These more straight-forward rock pieces seemed a little toostandard at first but, as with everything on this album, they laterrevealed some hidden depths. "Per Sempre Butterfly" is the highlight ofthe album and sucked me in straight away. Gianna Nannini's emotiveperformance is inspired and the layers of textured sounds and tabladrumming complement her voice perfectly. Sanctuary touches basewith many styles without sounding too trite or pretentious, however itdoes suffer because of its eclectism. Once I became familiar with thealbum and knew what to expect it clicked as a complete body of music.Hacke has made a very good album but it requires a little bit of workto fully appreciate what he has done.
Koolarrow
Repeated listenings reveal that the album's lack ofcontinuity is its strong point. It is like a series of audio postcardsfrom Hacke, each one giving a flavor of where he is. The album wasrecorded by Hacke during his travels and an army of guest artists(including J.G. Thirlwell, Andrew Chudy, David Yow and CasparBrötzmann) and the results were assembled into Sanctuary. Thereis no particular style that is common to every track, each one is itsown little microcosm. "Sister" is a mix of swirling guitars surging upduring breaks in the vocal sample taken from a women's self defencetutorial. This is the first point on the album that really captivatedme. The relaxed "Love me love my dog" is a massive shift of pace after"Sister," at this point I found myself being lulled into a cosysanctuary of my own. The title track and "Seven" are where Hacke getsto use all those guitar riffs that don't fit into Neubauten'srepertoire. These more straight-forward rock pieces seemed a little toostandard at first but, as with everything on this album, they laterrevealed some hidden depths. "Per Sempre Butterfly" is the highlight ofthe album and sucked me in straight away. Gianna Nannini's emotiveperformance is inspired and the layers of textured sounds and tabladrumming complement her voice perfectly. Sanctuary touches basewith many styles without sounding too trite or pretentious, however itdoes suffer because of its eclectism. Once I became familiar with thealbum and knew what to expect it clicked as a complete body of music.Hacke has made a very good album but it requires a little bit of workto fully appreciate what he has done.samples:
