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Mahogany, "Connectivity!"
Gearheads can be counted on to make a fantastic sounding record, however, unfortunately it is commonly difficult for gearheads to compose compelling enough songs to turn a good album into something fantastic enough to match the production.
Darla
Here's how to tell if a music nerd friend is a gearhead: notice what they remark on when they play a song. "Check out the [sound|treatment] of this [guitar|vocal|whatever]" versus "what a great song," and a subsequent singalong. Bobby was one of my best friends when he lived in Boston and whether it was a Bowery Electric show, Jack Dangers/Meat Beat Manifesto remix, or Cocteau Twins LP, it was always about the sound with him. Bobby, however, is one of the only people I know personally that I can say is truly a bloody genius and It's no wonder he moved on to work with music software. Together with Andrew Prinz, they form the core of Mahogany, and with the aid of Robin Guthrie, Mahoganey's latest album is heavenly to anybody who falls in love with sound. The songwriting, however, doesn't quite match the splendor of the production.
The songs are clearly influenced by another time, evidenced by the chunky Peter Hook-esque bass guitar or the cascading synth layers or even the Joy Division sample (they can't have come up with that sound) at the end of "Supervitesse." Whether or not they went into this record with the goal of recording one of those Factory Records tax writeoffs that LTM is always digging up or not, that's what they got. The vocals, unfortunately, seem like they're unneccessarily low on the priority scale. For the most part, the lyrics aren't memorable enough to be as sticking as some of the melodies, the delivery is restrained and weak, the lack of harmony when multiple singers are present is disappointing, and the overprocessed and overtreated production on the vocals makes it evident that they're trying to compensate for known downfalls.
I do actually find myself enjoing the album as a whole, however, as songs like "Supervitesse" have a very lovable and driving energy; the opening song, "Tesselation," is a perfect intro: lush and comforting like a fuzzy blanket to get lost in; and the bouncy "Neo-Plastic Boogie-Woogie" is the type of joy that we all got when we first heard Belle and Sebastian. (Although it's just sickeningly Twee enough to make me want to eat a veal burger and punch a college kid in pajama bottoms.) "Domino Ladder Beta" is a bit too mopey/navel-gazey in its original form but thankfully the Robin Guthrie-enhanced version on the bonus disc brings the vocals to the foreground and makes a much mor musicially rich version of the song
It's easy to see Mahogany have worked long and hard on this disc, and as a bonus have included some decent remixes, but a more enjoyable bonus are the three music videos included as enhanced content on the second CD. (Yes, it's known I'm a sucker for both enhanced content and music videos.) We see the band dressed up and in train stations with "Supervitesse" (destined to become one of this year's biggest hits with the pop kids), a deluxe and beautiful eye candy animation/live clip montage for "One Plus One Equals Three Or More," and a fantastic video of a prom dance overrun by dancing adults in"Neo-Plastic Boogie-Woogie."
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