All the Die-Hard Yello fans have been waiting for
the new
master piece to arrive. As a matter fact, they
still have to
wait.
Some amongst us have been fortunate and blessed
by
whatever god. They received the promo directly or
through
friendly channels.
Let me first address some Yello software that
surfaced
after Motion Picture.
Mounted by the Gods. This movie soundtrack revealed a
Blank that had progressed to yet another level of
what
Yello is all about. Soundscapes unheard before
and still
so familiar. Those who know Yello could tell
the tracks
originated from Sample God Boris, even if not
aware
he was behind the tracks.
The Race - Brake Light Mix. Although I don't have
any
printed info on this asume it was Boris who
constructed
this very interesting remix. I believed it
transmitted a signal
with it's layered sounds an nearly hidden samples.
A signal
that secretly informed what to expect from The
Eye.
Topaz (Insect Mix). Well it sounds misty and
fogged. How
else can I discribe what I hear? But it remains a
track which
has the Yello Virus. An interesting theme,
balancing on the
border of Mission Impossible, but showing Blank's
love for
Big Beat.
And now The Eye...I'm as honest as
possible.
You may spank, torment and even shave
my
eyebrows off...
01: Planet Data
It starts off with a teasing reworked
bell-synth and progresses
into an ode to Kraftwerk. Some of the bridges in
between that
take your ears from segment to the next, are what
you'd expect
on an older Kraftwerk track. Further more it's
the brakes that
have a Hutter & Schneider kling (klang) to it.
But don''t get me wrong.
It does have an atmosphere of a modernised YGTSYTA
Excess track.
Yello is very much present in the typical
percussion fills and voice
percussions.
Next to the Kraftwerk feel it could well be
influenced by And One.
It gave me the needed chill...
02: Nervous
It starts of with the signal I received from
Topaz and Brake light. Very
delicate flanged sounds and a tremendous
transparency. It appears
to me as a link to Zebra where the rhythm is
concerned.
I love vocoded voices. It reminds me of
Galactica and the Cylon Centurions.
Oh... and there is that smell of Solid
Pleasure. Dieter filling certain parts
like only he could. His sort of screaming voice,
expressing words while
being muted on the rhythm, leaving a pulsating
message for you to hear.
It contains lyrics in a definite Yello
Style...
It drags me along and makes me feel empty as soon
the track is over, with just
one cure.... play it again and again.
03: Don Turbulento:
Here we go. It starts of with a fragrance of
Mounted by the gods. But it soon
takes you along the sunset of tropical places.
Little voice percussion are layered
extreemly well in between the typical One Second
percussion. Little teasing
bells, and light toms and conga. Sweeping
brushes.
Dieter tells a tale, like only he can, and
like only he should. Anyone else should
leave it to Dieter if they feel a need to add it to
a track.
Dieter also takes us back to Solid Pleasure
here. We here him talk in a way that
is so strongly related to his earlier apearances in
Boris' work.
Here also the female voice has it's
introduction. A voice that is too non-Yello. After
getting acquainted with Billy McKenzy, Rush
Winters, Eleonore, or even the
mystical Farida, this girl/woman seems a tead bit
out of place. Only not as misplaced
in tracks yet to be addressed.
This track takes me to mr. Rossy and his dog.
Driving around in his car and a caravan.
A cartoon I watched while still a child. Oh sweet
memories.
04: Soul on Ice.
I feel the Zebra peaking into the studio.
But the Pictures with Motion have not left
yet. And track 04 is filled with what you
might have heard in Brake lIght and Topaz.
Dieter as the messenger does his thing and Yello is
definalty back in my room.
The melody used to transport the lyrics is at first
teasing and something to get
used to, but soon it will fire the fuel in the
Yello Oil Drum, and the heat is making you
want more and more, making the ice on your soul
melt.
05: Junior B.
After a the intro measures the speed and
tempo, the baseline takes you back to
where Baby could have taken you. The soft slide of
fading strings and soft choirs mixed
with the bass and percussion does tell you're
listning to Yello, but there's the female
singing again, which she should do on other
projects. Her voice has to rough
harmonics. She would fit perfectly in a bar with
some live band playing gits, bass and drums.
A place where no one really is
listening.
Here on Junior B, she should have kept silent and
just have Dieter tell us something
about Junior. The woman is trying to do her best. A
bit too much. A trained ear can
hear her attempts to keep track of the emotion her
voice should evoke while listening
Junior B.
06: Tiger Dust.
This one fits perfectly in what we've learned from
Pocket Universe. But still it features
enough of the new tricks Boris tought himself. The
smell of Brake Light crawls up your nose,
and the voices used as percussion do the trick to
make it Yello and not something else.
Although I must address that I would also believe
this to be a remix done by some
DJ who needed the money to get his own crap in the
stores.But this would be the first
real good remix ever done by a DJ who was allowed
to get his/her -dirty- hands on Yello.
07: Distant Solution
Here we go again. Motion Picture? Pocket Universe?
The intro with sweeping choirs
is indeed layered with a noise that seems a
mutation of the one used on Pocket
Universe. And after a long time we hear spanish
guitars again. Has Chico paid
a visit to the Yello Studio's? It would be a nice
surprise.
In this track we hear the female again. This time
her voice has been treated enough to
be alowed a preasance as a support to Dieters
language skills. South American.
But it sounds to un-Yello to me and somehow it
doesn't.
Ah damn... I'll shut up ...it's good as it is. Nice
and cozy. It's warm and teases my
eardrums. I'm all ready singing along...which
should speak for itself.
08:Hypsters Delay.
Who have been around the mailing list for some time
will already know this track
is the Loud and Clear surprise. A track I forgot to
mention in my prologue.
I have a thing for unconventional use of sounds and
arrangements. Therefor it was this
track that kept teasing me and I inhaled it
deep into my mind, to record it to my
virtual harddrive.
The master of sound, the god of samples is really
showing off.
I must add that this track is different from the
Loud & Clear version. So something
to be collected and cause confusion on Kazaa...
LOL.
I like this. Not a whole record full, but it's a
welcome instrumental in between the rest.
09: Time Palace.
Now I know were I heard this type of voice before.
It is a Dido - alike. This voice should
fit perfectly on the Faithless albums. You know...
they who have one massive track that
makes you buy the album and toss it in the bin as
soon as you find out that the rest
of the album has nothing to do with
it.
This track, time palace, makes me flip the coin and
claim something like this.
The voice of the woman is so dominant, that it
almost appears that I'm listening to her
album, and that this track was remixed/produced by
Boris...
Still it has something about it that will have me
sing to it while driving my old Chevrolet
into a fading purple sky somewhere in the Northern
parts of Holland. I even dare to claim
to hear the woman attemting to add some Billy...
10: Indigo Bay.
Oh Boris, make my heart bleed again with your
drums! Make my heart race
as you layer your fairlght treated sounds over
them. Take me on that journey where
your mind was when constructing something like
this. Make me fill in the spaces with
my own words. Let me be the DIeter that just left
the studio when you added this
to the score list of The Eye...
I say... Mounted by the Gods... Cleaned up and
fixed to fit The Eye as brow or lashes.
If it were the contact lens of The Eye, the album
would have been totaly different and truly Yello.
11: Unreal.
The first sounds I hear take me to David Sylvian
and Holger Tsukay (forgot to spell
it correctly). But again it is the voice of the
woman that takes me away from Yello.
Again I feel like listening to her album, and
Dieter and Boris helped her make some
good tracks, to lift her album out of the mondain
music that flood the music stores.
Oh... Dieter.... Oh Boris... What made you convince
to use her voice instead
of Stina, Rush or... or... Farida? Can't you hear
how hard she's trying to do
her thing? Only few can understand what Stina is
singing, but this woman
is just to load and rough. Is that Loud &
Clear?
12: Bougainville.
The last one. Again and Again and Again. Here we
have yet another track that has
the fearless Blank and his Soneto Electronico
skill. We are taken into a moving
realm of sound and very Yello like flow of
percussion that have To the Sea lingering
through, with yet again the nearly missed Dieter
who tells us something in French.
My French is as good as my Swahili, and I have no
idea what is going on. With its'
three minutes it far too short.
Conclusion:
It is as always very important not be mislead by
the name on the cover.
This album... yeah it is Yello, it is good, but it
could have been better, taking in mind
that it took so long for it to surface. I
understand that Boris and Dieter were involved
in a lot of aother projects, but
still.
If you listen to it and you know all the earlier
albums by heart, so you are as me
invected by the Yello Virus, you will agree that
this album is lacking something.
Perhaps it is the complexity of sound you find on
Pocket Universe and Motion
Picture, or the roughness on Stella and YGTSYTA
Excess. Or even the very
experimental and pioneer like drive on Solid
Pleasure and Claro Que Si.
Don't get me wrong here. I'm happy and glad to hear
something again that
emerged from the Yello Studio's. Not too much
artists have this rather
emotional impact on me. No too many sound engineers
give me the shivers
and make the hair on my arms stand up. Next to my
girl it's only Yello
that can do it and keep on doing it.
Most of all I miss the Excentric feel. That
particular way how Boris can forge
something into something so distinguishable from
the rest in music land.
This feel is still there, but somehow it is more faint compared to the rest
I have collected over the years. But then again...
maybe I have to get used to this
just like I had to make a switch when Depeche
Mode underwent a change after
Violater when Songs of Faith and Devotion made it's
entrance.
I do miss Dieter in The Eye. Instead of the woman
singing he should have
gotten in the mike booth and use his typical voice
to tell us the tales
he has come up with while listening to Blank's
soundscapes.
The pressence of the female is too dominant on The
Eye. One track would
have sufficed. And if my girl wasn't such a shy
butterfly she would have
done a great job, if not better.
But still. You lot out there should be heading to
the stores and place
your order to lay your hands on this new Yello
album. It is one
not te be left out of the collection. There's more
than a handfull of tracks
that do feed the mind and still the hunger after
Motion Picture.
And a second but: I just hope our two Swiss friends
will not make us
wait too long again with yet another Yello album.
Yes!!! I'm already
waiting for the follow up. What I said a while back
has happened.
The time I had to wait to hear new Yello Magic, has
increased the hunger
to such an extend that it is not stilled after
listening to The Eye.
So Boris & Dieter, if you have some guys or
galls on your payroll
to read what is going on in this list, I can only
urge you to head back
to the studio again and compile even more
goodies.
I'm in heat, I'm in need, I'm infected, I need the
drug, I need the Yello
Virus to be fed, I'm love with Yello, I need my
heart to be soothed,
I need...I beg... I .... I....
sigh...
Your Yello Adict Rene