Research & Development
It’s not an easy trick that Stereolab turn, time and again: making records that’re distinct without ever truly diverting from their singular sound. In their nearly-20-years of existence, the London-based outfit have covered a lot of stylistic ground, plucking tonalities and modalities from pop-culture’s retrofuturist refuse like particularly picky magpies.
Born from a love of the rhythmic repetition of kruat-rock and the early synthesizer experiments of BBC’s Radiophonic Workshop, Stereolab have hardly let those two esoteric basic strains curb their genre-juggling eclecticism. They’ve drawn from Italian cinema soundtracks, minimalist modern composition, Brazilian tropicalistas, experimental abstract-electro boffins, post-rock studio weenies, and British 1970s sitcom themesongs. To begin with.
Heterogeneous Mixtures Are Non-Uniform
Though every Stereolab album sounds, in a sense, exactly the same, no two are truly alike. The defining characteristics are there —squelches and burbles of modular synths, motorik rhythms, Laetitia Sadier’s bi-lingual coos— but there’s always a subtle change at play; differences coming from within that radiate without.
Chemical Chords, the band’s first LP-proper since 2004’s Margerine Eclipse, finds Stereolab sounding surprisingly joyous. Their compositions may be forever jaunty, but often their dense sense of studio assemblage gives them a studied seriousness. This time, in aiming for something more streamlined, the band’s chief boffin Tim Gane has shaken off the shackles of the labcoat. Here, he knocks out songs short and sharp.
The Finery of Refinement
Which is not to say things, herein, aren't blessed with the complexities of, well, every other Stereolab record. Sean O’Hagan scores florid arrangements, numerous songs reinvent themselves several times in their three minutes, and I’m sure someone’s gargling —mouth full— along with the gurgling keyboards in “Self Portrait with ‘Electric Brain.’”
Though it marks a noticeable shift in the band’s trajectory, let’s be clear: it sounds like a Stereolab album. Inescapably so. The kneejerk criticism, in the face of an 11th consecutive record peddling the same product, is to decry the band for repeating themselves. Yet, in the face of the impressive Chemical Chords, that seems like misguided slander. Consider it Stereolab’s latest variation on a long-familiar theme.
Record Label: 4AD
Release Date: 19 August 2008
