Blockhead - Music By Cavelight

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Music reviews of Music By Cavelight

Music Review: 1st listen: a bit odd - 5 spins later: your new favorite LP
Rating: 5 Stars

Which brings us to the debut album of our producer at large. Nothing here is as propulsive as "No Regrets", dancable as "11:35", or direct as "Daylight" (though initial printings came with a bonus disc of 5 Aesop Rock instrumentals along with it). But that isn't what Blockhead is focusing on - if he wanted to make an album of beats you could freestyle over so you could get a Def Jux deal, then he would have, but wisely decided against it. This is a slow, medatative, sorrowful album that is multilayered, multifaceted, and highly emotional.

Yet, Blockhead can still amaze. Take "Hello Popartz" - the opening track. Over a playful keyboard and child-like guitar, he layers on samples of kids saying "Wah! / Wah! / We lost the game because of Blockhead!" It takes a minute, and then you realize what the sample is from - the animated Charlie Brown cartoons. Lucy always used to call Charlie "Blockhead" when he screwed up. The sample use is glorious - smart, self-concious, and just damn witty.

Yet the Block don't stop there. "Carnivores Unite" has an 808-powered drum beat with a strong rising and falling orchestral swell that nearly reaches catharsis (admittedly a groovy catharsis). Single "Insomniac Olympics" uses rusty trupets to conjure the song's title to glorious and haunting effect. "Triptych Part 1" part one uses the producer-trick-of-the-moment (Kanye West-style sped-up soul samples) to an actual tragic effect, as the uses of the repeating lines "There is no greater love" in a manner that remains hooky AND sad in the best possible sense. Highlight "Sunday Seance" starts with a mornful solo piano and transforms it into a synth-horn wash complete with scary girl vocal sample.

But don't think it all tragedy and sadness: "A Better Place" features a mind-bending, Hendrix-like guitar solo that astounds every time. Guitar effects, blues, rock, and otherwise, always tend to appear in the least expected places. Track "Cavelight" even uses a sitar to good effect!

This certainly isn't what the casual Blockhead fan is expecting, but fans of Four Tet, DJ Shadow, and a solemn RJD2 will find oodles of enjoyment. This may be a sad album, but it also just might be one of the best this year.

(Note: odd that two other instrumental albums, El-P's "High Water: Mark" and Broken Social Scene's rereleased "Feel Good Lost" also rank among the best so far in '04. Is instrumental music making a comeback? Hmmmm ...)

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