REVIEW: Friends of Dean Martinez, Atardecer (Knitting Factory)
- Tracey Bleile
Sporting a completely new line up of Friends, Bill Elm has taken his show and moved it from splashy poolside splendor straight into the heart of the desert at near-dark. Atardecer (apropos title: Spanish for "to get dark" or "grow dark") takes the beautiful backdrop instrumental and crash lands it upon the hardpacked sand lit by a zillion stars, cold and fiery at the same time. Aha! I smirkingly dub thee Atomic Lounge. But the Friends defy easy categorizing, and being in the all-or-nothing genre of instrumental music, they make that work to capture your attention and keep it seem like no work at all.
A dark shift in mood sees the abandonment of the brass and traditional keyboards used on past Friends' releases, and Bill Elm's signature lapsteel is relegated to more of a backing vocal role in many of the songs to allow for some new experimentation to creep in. Atardecer features much more programming, keyboards and effects, taking a sweet cowboy lope in the Friends' cover of "La fin de le'te'" and making it ever so slightly eerie and off-kilter. "Casa Mila" takes a more traditional intro from Elm's catalog and turns it on its ear with lots of spooky Moog and space phone guitar.
Although the disc likes to veer way out into sci-fi sound effect territory, with the squonks and bleeps of the opening track to the UFO blast off midway through "Contact," it always manages to slide back onto a more musical course and save Atardecer from too much goofiness. The classic swingin' vibe is kept alive in the slow-samba "Otra Vez," and the sinuous cry of the lapsteel and simple percussion of the title track keep you fully engaged and have you believing you can see the northern lights, even trapped in the heart of the city.
To be both retro and futuristic, and not be camp is an accomplishment. Call Atardecer music to set the end of the century to. No one here will argue.
