Customer Reviews

Pleasures of Electricity

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

 

 

Hmm, very Kraftwerk. In going back to a sound even older than that of his own first foray into Electronic music, 1980's 'Metamatic', John has produced an excellent record of timeless quality. And for lovers of 'Metamatic', the tracks here 'Invisible Women' and 'Quiet City' are clever reworkings of that past glory.

Equally at home on the CD players of oldies reminiscing on the golden age of synth rock, of DJs burning the uptodatest dancefloor tracks and of those looking for some serious chillout musik.

I have always been fascinated by John Foxx's surreal lyrics, and this collection of songs is nothing short of brilliant. A hypnagogic hallucination is a vivid, dreamlike hallucination that occurs as you are falling asleep. Some people see visions or hear people talking in that moment between waking and sleeping. John Foxx perfectly captures that moment on this album, and translates it to music. The lyrics often make you wonder if he is dreaming or awake; or living a moment in time or daydreaming about a moment in time. The music itself is minimal, clear, clean, and surreal without being disruptive. The dance beats of each song are very hypnotic and help to drive the dream like nature of the lyrics. John's voice is as beautiful and as clear as a bell ringing through fog. Relaxing yet exciting, beautiful yet surprising; thought provoking, and thoroughly entertaining.

On The Pleasures Of Electricity, John Foxx, along with Louis Gordon, returns to his early 80s Metamatic era sound, which was heavily influenced by Kraftwerk. In fact the song Camera reminds me a lot of Kraftwerk's Europe Endless and Neon Lights combined only Camera is much more dancable. Still Foxx manages to show a bit more emotion into his music on this album than Kraftwerk and he even he himself did on Metamatic
The song Invisible Women is basically a reworking of an earlier John Foxx song Underpass which is available on Metamatic. The same keyboard notes are also played in the song The Garden from the 1981 album of the same name. He's repeating himself but he does it so well. I love the soaring synth solo.
City Of Light is a great song to dance to and it features another soaring synth solo which is one thing John Foxx' is known for.
The Falling Room is probably my favorite song on the cd. Most of the vocals on The Pleasures Of Electricity are electronically altered but on The Falling Room you get John's real voice(for the most of the song) which I really enjoy. That's a bit ironic perhaps because the music is probably at it's strangest on this song.

Some other standouts for me are -
Automobile
Travel
Quiet City

This is some great music from one of the founding fathers of electronica.

As taken from Amazon UK:

Disc: 1

1. Funny Thing, A
2. Nightlife
3. Camera
4. Invisible Women
5. Cities Of Light
6. Uptown-Downtown
7. When It Rains
8. Automobile
9. Falling Room, The
10. Travel
11. Quiet City

Disc: 2

1. Funny Thing, A
2. Nightlife
3. Camera
4. Invisible Women
5. Cities Of Light
6. Uptown-Downtown
7. When It Rains
8. Automobile
9. Falling Room, The
10. Travel
11. Quiet City
12. Twilight Room
13. Screenplay

Whilst 'Crash & Burn' was hard-edged and dark, this is much more introverted and vulnerable. The Pleasures of Electricity is a strange album in many ways and very unusual. It is unlike anything else by John Foxx and just about unlike anything else I've heard.
The music "grooves" along in a quiet and beguiling way - sort of like a "Pastoral Kraftwerk". The music is very well crafted, melodic and it has a very infectious feel to it. "Invisible Women" has a quote from "Underpass" - the string synthesizer 'ritornello' from that song.

Many of the songs have a languid and unhurried feel to them. It is as if John Foxx has decided to spend some time with his ideas and music on this album and is happy to let the songs be as long as they need to be. The sound is less "hard-edged" than Metamatic or Crash & Burn, but much more organic and sophisticated than The Garden or In Mysterious Ways. It is a little like a calmer and more thoughtful version of The Golden Section, without the occasional and generally unnecessary intrusion of electric guitars.

The Pleasures of Electricity is a superb album in my opinion. It was rewarding for me the first time I listened to it and it continues to be a source of pleasure and mental stimulation for me. Great "armchair" listening, but, I dare say, it would sound awesome in a nightclub through a big sound system.

With this album John Foxx ventures into the thinking part of his brain, much akin to when he was reading the Futurists in his early teens. Step back for a second and encompass what I am actually saying.
This entire album goes above the dance/sex/detached signature that John Foxx and all his work with ULTRAVOX! accomplished. While still using the minimalist beat/melody style, John takes the lyrics to new heights not visited for 200+ years. Don't be afraid or cynical, I am speaking of the English Romantics such as Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Blake, etc, etc..
Let us look at "Quiet City". Herein lies Wordworth's poem "London". It is what happens in the city, guided by its structure, that is important, not the city in as much; in Foxx's time the quiet in the early morning hours with the paper floating in the sewer wash, with Wordworth in the barges floating down the Thames.
"Invisible Women" smacks with the romantic vision of women always being beyond the humourless treatment/status given them in this male dominated world in much the same situation today as when Frankenstien was first being created in an after dinner conversation 200 some years ago.
"Camera" speaks of the idea that a mechanical/digital device has the possibility of capturing or mimicing thoughts and familiar mental recountings of one's history in photographic form, from which may be syntesised Wordworth's recalling in "Lines written a few Miles above Tintern Abbey" that poetry (in this case music) is best written after the compulsive expression exploding from the mind after much thought.
"Funny Thing" explores the invisible line between men and women that the romantics often adressed but never full identified; in how men and women in essence are involved in sameness but that how social definitions change the individuals mind to somehow socially place and confine both the roles of men and women.
I could go on to explain how "Travel" dances with the romantics traveling to view classical civilisations in their origins, or how "Cities of Light" explores the changing of cities and their histories and universities from being a drawing factor for intellectuals into a drawing force for insects and long lonely early morning walks what with the different technological mediums being used for physical rather than mental illumination, or even how "Automobile" changes metal boxes into seductive women but then I would leave out the important case of John Foxx's and Louis Gordon's much maligned music.
John and Louis have given music much the same beauty, style, and grace, through minimilising while taking away the fluff and unnecessary fury of overthinking and oversimplifying that music is doing today, much as the romantics did for human thought in the late/early 18th/19th centuries. If nothing else, I thank these two New Pioneers for the return to humanity by debugging the music industry with simplicity in this much to often overly digital age.