Zero 7 - The Garden
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Free Music Notes for The Garden
Free Music Review: Elevator Music
Hit: 2 Stars
This is a boring album.
The first song, Futures, is deceiving. It is a masterpiece of a song. It blew me away the first time I played it. The end of it is pure electronic bliss. I always turn up the volume here. The rest of the album is nothing like this song. It is largely lounge pop and accessible elevator music. It is not very engaging. It sounds like the well-produced work of a jam band that picked out "best of" selections in a long, groovy session. There are a couple of interesting sections and songs like "If I Can't have You", "you're my flame", and "waiting to die" are good songs. "This Fine Social Scene" is a close second to "Futures". It is very eerie and very good. Unfortunately, the connecting songs are filler. Maybe this band should stick to singles and wait longer between albums.
Free Music Review: Wilted Garden
Hit: 2 Stars
The first track on this new album suggests that Sam Binns and co. are taking a cue from early 70s prog-rock/folk, much as OPETH did with their sublime, beautiful Damnation in 2005. However, the rest of the album retreats back to the soul/lounge styling of the first two albums, but with none of the gorgeous, swooning melodies they offered. The whimsical, kitschy instrumentals from Simple Things are gone as well, replaced by some flat, childish sing-songy pieces like 'Pageant of the Bizarre'. Even a mostly beautiful track like Throw It All Away is marred by an odd chorus. Very disappointing, especially given how great a find Simple Things was when it came out.Free Music Review: Absolute Perfection.
Hit: 5 Stars
I fell in love with Zero 7 when a friend suggested them to me 3 years ago. I have been addicted to them ever since. I think "The Garden" is their best album to date. Sia offers her beautifully chilling voice to a lot of the tracks, which is key for me. This is definitely one of my top 10 favorite albums of all time, along with Simple Things and When it Falls. My favorite tracks are "You're my Flame", "Throw it all Away", "Futures", "Crosses", and "If I can't have you."
I will now anxiously await their next masterpiece.
Free Music Review: Ever Evolving
Hit: 5 Stars
After reading some of the other reviews I was amazed to see so many Zero 7 fans dissapointed by The Garden. What an amazing transformation this album was from the previous two recordings. Honestly, the first time I listened to the CD I didn't like it at all. I decided to listen again and it starting catching my attention quickly. By the 3rd or 4rd play I was definetely hooked and now I absolutely love it...it's one of my top 10 all time favorites. Maybe some of you should give it another chance.
The album definitely differs from previous albums but it still very much the Zero 7 sound that I know and love. It sounds to me like Zero 7 has taken their usual style and added soooo much more in terms of "fillings". Imagine looking at a childs coloring book...it's filled with enjoyable pictures, inviting environments, clean lines, and images that provoke some imagination. Although very enjoyable, when you stand back and look at the entire book there's still room for improvement. Now picture the same book as it's filled with brilliant colors...bringing forward and explosion of life and excitement to an already enjoyable experience.
This is how I feel about Zero 7. I've always liked them enough to buy the CD's but I never thought of them as one of my favorites until now. Their additional explosion of creativity in The Garden filled a void that I never knew was there. They've painted a picture in the form of music that I can't get out of my head and I am truely in love with the music.
Free Music Review: In the Garden recycle bin
Hit: 2 Stars
The other day, I was watching Jay Leno. I rarely do, please forgive me! David Spade showed us how much of a funny guy he can be and I enjoyed the show. Up till the band moment, when I immediately zap, it's a habit. Going back and forth, I actually went back on Leno and the band stroke me on being quite good. After 30 seconds of internally repeating "who are these guys??", I recognized Zero 7. The song was amazing. They had assembled a whole band, vintage keyboards and all, with some bloke front man singing on a chair. The guy didn't really amaze me tho, it was The Sound of Zero 7, live and coordinated by Binns (or Hardaker) from behind his keyboards. Great moment. The song did really sound fresh and exciting. "It looks like they went back to their original, untouched, pure sound" I thought.
Back and forth from the store. Out of the wrap. First song, that's the one! First deception. It's not as great as on the show!!! (it's usually the opposite...) The version on the CD is like a dried-out, much shorter, robot-like, ill-quantized version of it! The heart and soul of what made the song a true Performance on TV was gone. Anyway, it's still quite good, let's see the rest.
The rest of the CD just passes over my head. I'm sorry to say, it's bland! There's no such moment anywhere. On Simple Things, some songs would be like "there they go on that progression, we're in it, that's the moment!!". Here, nothing! No moment. No thrill.
Let's rationalize this thing for a moment. What happened?
Needless to say, Simple Things was a masterpiece. Some people live out of this album. I used to buy copies to friends for their birthdays! Next.
When it falls was a bid disappointment. The voice of Mozez didn't quite do it for me, and musically it wasn't anything we hadn't heard already on ST. And what's with all this Lo-Fi nonsense? Anyway, the only thing that did stand out for itself was the title track "When it falls". Until I discovered "Heather" by Billy Cobham. If you like "When it falls", you might like it too... wink, wink, nudge, nudge... Nuff said.
In this respect, The Garden was a forecasted failure. We've seen it coming. Vocals are all around, barely any resemblance to the originals. Like someone said earlier, flashes of light. Exactly. You can find The Sound of Zero 7 somewhere in there but only if you really concentrate. Unfortunately, we shouldn't have to do that! It should be obvious!
I have my little theory. Here it is. It's quite obvious on the three major albums that Binns and Hardaker are gifted producers. They can create some really trippy tracks if only they know where they're going.
Am sure that you've heard how similar the Zero 7 sound is to the Air sound. I usually disregard these remarks, the resemblance is easy. But it's quite true. It's not just vaguely similar, it's very similar. On Simple Things, I noticed the songs Destiny, Give it Away, Red Dust and Spinning, song structure, chord progression, even some sounds are the same as the ones found in the best tunes of Premiers Symptomes and Moon Safari(La femme d'argent, Talisman, All I need). That's not by shear luck or magic. Mind you, they're free to use some ideas from Air, everybody has influences. And nobody's gonna mind when the outcome is such a great album. Yet, Binns and Hardaker do know that they've heavily been influenced by Air on their first album, and people noticed it. What they want, is to make it their own, create their own version of it. They include more vocals, try different things on When it Falls. Some people like it, I did for a while. They think they've done it and that's the way to go. They decide to go all the way.
And so you get The Garden.
Hell, even Air went in the wall after some time trying to reinvent themselves (i.e. 10,000 Hz Legend).
My wish? More genuine moments, stretched out and creative, an album with some tracks only played live perhaps?
Leave this one out and pray for those two geniuses to find themselves again.