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Marsen Jules, "Herbstlaub"
This new effort from Martin Juhls under the name "Marsen Jules" is apleasant meditation on plant life that easily reflects its intendedsubject matter without offering much commentary along the way.
City Centre Offices
It's notclear where the digital technology employed in these compositionsbegins and where the acoustic instrumentation ends, but that kind ofdeconstruction of method and technique is superfluous when a record isas direct and one-dimensional as this one. While there are six songslisted in the liner notes, the parts play out more like movements orrepetitions of a single theme, where ambiguous clouds of melody floatin and out of the sunlight, marking the passing of meditative time,choosing not to get in the way. Perhaps the zen quality of music thatis this natural and reflective is lost on me in a busy world oftechnological noises and urban landscapes, but I find it hard toconcentrate on Jules' compositions for what they are rather than whatthey could be. With a simple theme such as "Autumn Leaves," my mindraces to imagine the myriad ways the subject could be approachedsonically. What Jules provides here is a pretty and warm but ultimatelydetached look out the window of one of those angular steel and glasshomes that I see in design magazines. The leaves outside are calming.They are soaked with a fresh rain on an overcast Sunday morning, and Herbstlaubis playing in the background as I sip espresso in my slippers and itall seems ideal and sanitized and beautiful and vacant, forcing me tolisten again to see if I've missed something. In the end, this isinconsequential mood music made deftly and softly by a craftsman withan ear for fragile melodies and an eye for nature, but with a voicethat could be saying much more.
City Centre Offices
It's notclear where the digital technology employed in these compositionsbegins and where the acoustic instrumentation ends, but that kind ofdeconstruction of method and technique is superfluous when a record isas direct and one-dimensional as this one. While there are six songslisted in the liner notes, the parts play out more like movements orrepetitions of a single theme, where ambiguous clouds of melody floatin and out of the sunlight, marking the passing of meditative time,choosing not to get in the way. Perhaps the zen quality of music thatis this natural and reflective is lost on me in a busy world oftechnological noises and urban landscapes, but I find it hard toconcentrate on Jules' compositions for what they are rather than whatthey could be. With a simple theme such as "Autumn Leaves," my mindraces to imagine the myriad ways the subject could be approachedsonically. What Jules provides here is a pretty and warm but ultimatelydetached look out the window of one of those angular steel and glasshomes that I see in design magazines. The leaves outside are calming.They are soaked with a fresh rain on an overcast Sunday morning, and Herbstlaubis playing in the background as I sip espresso in my slippers and itall seems ideal and sanitized and beautiful and vacant, forcing me tolisten again to see if I've missed something. In the end, this isinconsequential mood music made deftly and softly by a craftsman withan ear for fragile melodies and an eye for nature, but with a voicethat could be saying much more. samples:
