Mars Audiac Quintet

Stereolab | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 28, 2011)
• Original Release Date: August 9, 1994
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Elektra/Asylum
• ASIN: B000002HG2
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #124,785 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Most accessible of early Stereolab, December 27, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Mars Audiac Quintet (Audio CD)

I was just given this as a gift to complete a hole in my Stereolab collection. I hit play on the CD player, my jaw hit the table and didn't shut until it was over. If you own an early album by this band (Switched On, Refried Ectoplasm, Transient Random, etc.) and are wondering which one to get next, this is it. If you own later stuff by the band, are wondering what the earlier stuff is like, and don't like too much grit in your pop, this is the one too. Gorgeous drones, lots of repetition, drums and guitars, bilingual lyrics, analog synth washes, this one has it all. Classic Stereolab. Don't wait six years to get this like I did.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Possibly their best, April 7, 2005

By 

Mark - See all my reviews

This review is from: Mars Audiac Quintet (Audio CD)

When I first heard this album, I thought, "Oh, no, more organs, more repetition, same old drumbeat for every song, same old everything." However, a second listen is needed to fully appreciate this as a standalone album. With Peng! formerly being my favorite record by the groop, I was hoping to pick up Transient Random Noise Bursts with Announcements, their second album, but since there were none on the shelf, I settled for this, their third.

Mundane (or actually just poor) album art aside, this one started as a disappointment and quickly skyrocketed up to the top of my list. Unlike their other albums, this one relies much more heavily on melody than harmony, which later albums do not reflect. Like any Stereolab (Dots and Loops aside), it's different, but it's still the same sound. It's much lighter-hearted and less distorted than the work on Refried Ectoplasm, but comparitively Refried Ectoplasm is the closest thing to this out there.

My top five Stereolab songs:
1) John Cage Bubblegum (Refried Ectoplasm)
2) The Stars our Destination (Mars Audiac Quintet)
3) Jaunty Monty and the Bubbles of Silence (Instant 0 in the Universe EP)
4) Outer Accelerator (Mars Audiac Quintet)
5) Perversion (Peng!)

And thus, this is the one that I deem Stereolab's best. Introduce yourself to Stereolab with it or pick it up to fatten up your collection. Either way, this is a solid and 100% stellar album.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant Pop w/ intelligent subversive political undertones, July 29, 2004

By 

M. Savoie "waxnwane" (Bound Brook, NJ USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Mars Audiac Quintet (Audio CD)

This album, now ten years old, seems more relevant today than ever before, in our world of increasingly corrupt politicians and perverted concepts of "morality."

To get a sense of Stereolab's sound, combine 70's German Krautrock (Neu!, Can, Faust, et al), Velvet Underground, Beach Boys backing vocals, bassanova and samba, space age bachelor pad music inventiveness, Pavement, Suicide, Mouse on Mars meets Tortoise; vintage instruments like farfisa, harmonium, moog, mellotron, vox organ, theremin; Nietsche, Marx and other communist ideas, French literature such as Baudelaire; an occasional pinch of goddess-based leanings; space exploration; and much much more. There is a lot in the mix, and they have never had qualms about blatantly ripping off obscure songs and literature, but they make it all so smooth and palatable and dreamy that it is just too irresistable. Their bag of goodies never seems to run out of vintage ideas from below the surface, and they have become trendsetters for this.

Mars Audiac Quintet, the groop's third full-length, is the album which earned them the rank of the "Moog Terrorists". There are so many delicious layers of organs here! (just listen to track one and feel the 'Three-Dee Melodie'.) Some songs here build up long drones to illustrate a sociopolitical point that we've become too accustomed to not paying attention to our leaders' misuse of power ('Transona Five', 'Anamorphose', 'New Orthophony') while some are pop songs illuminating the same complacency. 'Ping Pong', a title suggesting both a back and forth action and a passive observation from the sidelines, is one of the band's the catchiest pop numbers. As for the lyrics:
"There's only millions that lose their jobs and homes and sometimes accents. There's only millions that die in their bloody wars, it's alright. It's only their lives and the lives of their next of kin that they are losing... Don't worry, be happy, things will get better naturally. Don't worry, shut up, sit down, go with it and be happy." (The 'Don't worry' part is all a sarcastic yet ironic summary of what the public majority actually is doing in the face of denial of social decline.) These sentiments are echoed in 'Outer Accelerator': "In whatever society, there continually will seem to be just a few men keen to rule, overwhelming the majority. We'll assent and allow them to do so." 'Nihilist Assault Troop' deals with our so-called "morality".

As one friend once put it, Tim Gane's drone-pop and Laetitia Sadier's marxist revolutionary lyrics clash in a decidely political irony. While the message is sometimes hidden in lulling drones, sometimes wrapped up in kitschy pop, if you listen closely you will hear them call on you--to wake up and face the music of what is going on.

(Incidentally, about 1/3 of the songs are sung in French; singer/writer Laetitia Sadier is from Paris.)