Customer Reviews

Lifetime Away

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm not really into ambient, trance, gothic or any of that other stuff. My primary tastes in music are in Bach, Wagner, Yes, Genesis, Stevie Wonder, Shostakovich, Led Zepplin, etc. So,as you can clearly see, my taste, eclectic though it may be, doesn't really lend itself to bands like Perfume Tree. However, this album really does it for me--Go figure! See Me Smile is incredible. That intense rhythmic drive coupled with the Enya-esque voice and the layering of vocals and bleeps and Guitar all make for a luscious landsape of lovely listening pleasure!

I guess one of the reasons I like it so much is that they seem to have captured that same sort of groove essence that, say, Pink Floyd had going on Meddle or that Genesis were doing on Selling England by the Pound (Cinema Show) and Trespass.

Some of you out there might find these comparisons a bit absurd, but I don't care. From one who usually finds this genre of music bogus, A Lifetime Away by Perfume Tree is, in book at least, a real jewel.

CMC

This grew on me fast and is difficult to take out of my CD player. My wife calls it doper music but I call it great. They need to find a major label.

Perfume Tree presents an album full of late night groove music, slow and sensual basslines snaking around through open-air, Cocteau Twins soundscapes. Singer Jane (the band are identified by first names only on this CD) whispers high notes with a clear, strong timbre while the band lopes along, inspired by both Brian Eno's concepts of ambience music and Jamaican dub reggae. A special alchemy takes place here, setting Perfume Tree apart from Morcheeba or Massive Attack by reason of their band interplay. This doesn't sound like a studio project; it feels like an album by a fully developed band. This is the best example of sexy, pulsating, delicate, low-simmer sexadelic funk you'll ever hear. The follow-up album, "Feeler", is not nearly as inspired.

This is a fantastic album, and I'm glad that I've dusted it off after a dozen years. It still packs the pleasing punch that it did when it was released. The ethereal vocals, the driving guitars, the harmonics, the lyrics, the whole package all make for a rapturous listen.

I'm not a music nut... dusting off this album was part of a return to listening to my music collection at all, a habit I'd fallen out of. You don't need to be a devotee of dub or trance or however this stuff is categorized... this is just good.

This album has one great song, Virgin, and a handful of decent mood music. Virgin justifies the price of the album. It is one of my favorite songs. It reminds me of Cocteau Twins' Blue Bell Knoll. It's airy, dark, and melodic. The short clip here does not include the best part of the song, which is a high range call that lifts the song briefly to a vista before returning to the darker sighs that you hear in the clip.

Anyone who loves ambient goth should love Virgin. That song justifies the price of the album.

I first heard the song So Far Away from this album on a Pandora station I had created devoted to groups such as Dead Can Dance and Cocteau Twins. I later bought the follow-up album to this, Feeler, and enjoyed that enough to warrant hunting down this album. I must say, Feeler pales in every sense to what Perfume Tree manages to do with A Lifetime Away.

Several reviewers mention Virgin as the only truly good song on the album. I too believe that Virgin is an incredible song, but to say that it is the best sells the rest of the album short. Blue Stars is notable for it's cool, distant beat, while the irregular rhythm of The Nightmirror combined with Jane's ethereal vocals is arresting. The instrumental August fades seamlessly into the distorted vocalizations of Crystal Tips, and the entire thing is capped off with the dreamily danceable Late Light.

This is the kind of album that automatically makes it seem as though it is two in the morning, and it's sonic twists, turns, and distortions may not suit everyone's tastes, but if you're the sort of person who enjoys ethereal ambient and trance music, I highly recommend buying this CD, and as I have never seen it sold anywhere for more than six dollars, there is really no excuse for not doing so.

When Perfume Tree's excellent "Lifetime Away" was released, the Shoegazing movement was slowly dying off. Shades of the short-lived genre are present throughout this album. Although it's not a dead ringer or a copy of great albums by luminaries such as My Bloody Valentine, Slowdive or Ride, their style and sound are coupled with a Delerium-esque ethnic groove to make a goth-tinged ambient dance stew.

Fans of the Projekt label (Black Tape for a Blue Girl, Love Spirals Downwards, etc.) will take a lot from Perfume Tree's approach on this album. Lovely, though widely unintelligible, vocals soothe while the fuzzy guitars and beats lull listeners into a head-bobbing hypnosis. Who knew dance music could be this deep and entrancing?

In my opinion, "Lifetime Away" is far superior to "Feeler," Tree's follow-up.

Virgin, reminiscent of the Cocteau Twins at their best, is one of my favorite songs. Period. I give only 4 stars because the rest of the album is just decent trance. If you can find this album used, or if you can get just Virgin as an MP3, do it.