Joe Goddard ft. Valentina – Gabriel
He’s from Hot Chip, she’s from Myspace…
[Video][Website]
[6.29]
Brad Shoup: Infatuation with the flutter proves fatal here. I’m a fool for a breathless second-person address, filled with phrases piling on each other: a troubled mind on overload, bent for satisfaction. But this track is suspended between strengths: a purely abstract approach, as broached by the intro, would have suited; so would a version filled with brimstone and blood. Instead, the airy skip of the track lifts the condemnation into the sky, until it’s hard to glimpse.
[5]
Jer Fairall: Glassy and austere, which makes it all the more startling when the vocals start in on a winding and emotionally complex narrative. I haven’t quite managed to decode exactly what is going here yet, whether she’s railing against a button-pushing lover or shooting the ultimate messenger, but her barely constrained passion is such a tense counterpoint to the restraint of the music that I spend nearly six minutes fearing that the whole thing is about to implode.
[7]
Iain Mew: Reminds me a lot of the Jamie xx single, with the way it puts together disjointed vocals and sounds to create something atmospheric and coherent. The difference is this has a song on top too. And what a song! Mysterious, sad and sung with a maginficent wounded strut that made me rush to check out Valentina’s own stuff (findings: it’s quite good). I love the way the miscued male vocal snippets make it feel like the other side of the story is trying to get in and not being allowed to. No steel drums though.
[8]
Katherine St Asaph: Are Valentina’s parts sampled? If not, they should be; just as Bob Sinclar made “Far l’amore” into a Home Goods wall plaque carved with “L’Italia,” I’m almost haunted but keep getting distracted by Joe’s babbling and scratching himself in the back of the studio.
[6]
Ian Mathers: Okay, so part of me wants to hear the ‘original’ of this, since it almost sounds like a remix (but a good one!). I do really enjoy the Shakira-esque timbre of her voice, and Goddard’s production is nicely springy and well-suited to that voice. And when the whole thing gets a little more fleshed out at the right moments, it suddenly, subtly turns “Gabrielle” into something kind of epic. I really hope this isn’t their only collaboration.
[7]
Jonathan Bogart: The glitch is too insubstantial to bear the weight of that voice; I’d like to hear her sing something that breaks free of the polite narcissism of wallpaper techno.
[5]
Alfred Soto: The house beat and mumbled vocals create a frisson pleasant enough to get my shoulders moving, although my feet are still thinking about it. In 1999 I would have heard prototypes like this before 1 a.m. and after 5 a.m. at gay clubs.
[6]