Friday, December 18th, 2015

AMNESTY 2015: Autour de Lucie – Ta Lumière Particulière

Post-millennium nostalgia


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[7.43]

Katherine St Asaph: A dangerous, seductive sentence: “I know what I like.” It is dangerous because it lures you away from the zeitgeist, where human conversations and connections are made (not to mention, for me, a living), and from new genres and sounds and ideas, into a musical walled garden impenetrable to anyone but you. It is seductive for the same reasons, and I know what I like. I wouldn’t have expected that to be Autour de Lucie; the two albums I’d heard were the sort of limpid mid-’90s alt-rock and late-’90s trip-hop that leads curmudgeons to dismiss entire genres as creativity landfills. I wouldn’t have even heard this had I not stumbled upon French radio halfway through this year. But it is what I like, and everything I like: wistful Sundfør dramatics, lead bass, swooning and brooding set to guitars, smoke and reverb and everything that makes the world seem that much more cinematic. It innovates nothing — even the rises and falls are timed to the particular formulaic seconds of EDM — and doesn’t need to.
[9]

Jonathan Bogart: I have feelings about that guitar sound, which reminds me uncomfortably of the ways in which I spent the early 2000s (not not electroclash would be how the kids would put it, I think), but who cares about feelings when you’ve got that bassline.
[7]

Edward Okulicz: Had this come out between 1998 and 2002 and been sung by some impossibly British woman like Sarah Nixey (the verse even reminds me a bit of Black Box Recorder’s “Sex Life”) I would have basically frothed at the mouth, bought several copies of the CD and put the song on every mix tape I made. The feeling of speed from the drums kicking in over the messy riff is mostly a head-rush than a hip-rush, but how it surges without aggression or forsaking its cool is impressive. Just like that I need to hear if this lot have a second song as good as this.
[9]

Alfred Soto: The guitar squall is impressive, calling to mind Sky Ferreira’s “You’re Not the One,” and the other rhythmic tricks aren’t bad either.
[7]

Megan Harrington: Smooth, effortless, bubbling with carbonation — “Ta Lumière Particulière” disguises all the make-up and photoshop and angles that go into capturing one’s special light. I should feel envious but I’m just a little sad. 
[6]

Brad Shoup: It has one of my favorite nighttime casts: partying while hidden from an orange-black sky. The guitars stretch and lacerate; the bass sounds like a giant grunting. They’re wide-eyed and still luxuriating. Leulliot sings of border crossings and traffickers; I imagine passing under the right door will bring that sense of escape.
[7]

Madeleine Lee: I’m so stuck on that scratchy, sun-faded guitar that I didn’t notice until a few listens later how sleek and fully shaded the electronic environment is underneath it. It’s just the right texture to keep it from sounding too manicured.
[7]

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