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Edward Ka-Spel, "Fragments of Illumina"
While not creating strictly-formulated conceptalbums, the Legendary Pink Dots frontman does tend to take an idea or a mood and run with itthroughout a release. This is very much apparent on Fragments ofIllumina, which has a sense of wholeness and completeness despite theradically different approaches in its songs.
Legendary Pink Dots albums, at their worst, can sound likehorrible messes: a cacaphony of ideas, genres and quirks that refuse toharmonize. When Ka-Spel records a solo release,however, it's understood that it will be—at the very least—coherent from thebeginning to the end. The highlights are two tracks called"The End Of Everything," the first of which tells a classic Ka-Spelfairytale (life, afterlife, drolly humorous disappointment) and willhave Peggy Lee cocking whatever remains of her eyebrows. The secondpart sounds like a spaceship trying to take off from the BBC roofduring the 1970's...but in a good way, for those who like that sort of thing."Yet Another Fragment" is a gorgeous, delicate, extended moment offlangey ambience, a welcome follow-up to the (surprise!) stutteringhead-banging of "Sticks and Stones." The first track on the CD, "MySpace," is—sadly—the one sour note for me; a song whose lyrics arejarringly out-of-sync with the rhythm...I skip it, but it's unfortunatethat it opens an otherwise exceptional CD. Regardless, it's a testamentto Ka-Spel's skill that all these musical styles—effect-heavy ambiance,poetry, analog boopiness, obnoxious guitar sampling—can fit together onone album without sounding discordant, and that all of them are done sowell.
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