IN TOUCH WITH NATURE
written by gord.
'Nature' is an album that "concern(s) the end of journeys, waking up from sleep or realising certain things about the cosmic nature" according to its creator, Alex Botten, who when he records is known as Thee Moths. The album is full of strange loops, clicks, samples and beats, but Alex is not a person who is willing to do things the easy way.
A weekend in the summer of 2004, when Alex played gigs with Lucky Dragons, Bobby Birdman and Yacht opened his eyes to a whole new realm of music, as the three artists he was playing with all performed their sets entirely on their laptop computers, "in a way which wasn’t at all boring" states Alex. After many hours spent experimenting with his own laptop, the seeds of 'Nature' were sewn.
"The cut up approach of their music really switched me on to a load of extra possibilities about sound... things that I had thought vaguely about in the past but never thought to apply to my songs."
For those not in the know, pervious Thee Moths recordings were for the most part acoustic, but Alex has always been known to throw in unusual noises and samples. On 'Nature', he lets the songs take a backseat to his laptop loops. There are only a few 'songs' in the traditional sense on this nineteen track album, but the ones that are there are possibly the best he’s written.
'This Is My Time' is a particularly wonderful song, a nylon-strung acoustic plinking along with dreamy vocals, the whole thing shrouded in Nintendo style beeps and staggering drum loops.
Album opener 'Awake! Awake!' features a sample of yachts in Tayport harbour, which had a "rhythmic clanking" about them, according to Alex. The rest of the first track features birds chirping and guest vocals from his girlfriend, Milly.
On 'You Shitting Little Fucks' Alex sampled one of his previous bands, Kosmische, onto a track that frankly made me want to get up and dance. "That one has 'the beat'" says Alex with a smile.
The one thing that stands out about 'Nature' is that there is not one second of silence, every track flowing seamlessly into the next. It is definitely an album that needs to be listened to in its entirety, simply hearing a single track would not do it justice, as all the songs here fit nicely together, despite their differences, like a kind of sonic patchwork quilt, and Alex’s songwriting ability shines through again on the latter portion of 'You Are A Great Wave', sounding like an interesting version of Bright Eyes.
If you are familiar with previous Thee Moths albums, 'The Need' and 'A Small Glass Ghost', you will be aware of Alex’s tendencies to mask his vocals, many lyrics becoming completely unintelligible. Luckily on 'Nature', the vocals for the most part, are as clear as day. "I think that is more down to my growing confidence in my own singing more than anything else. Also I think I am getting better at mixing vocals" explains Alex.
The 'Twenty Beats' mix of the first track (a play on the name of his record label project, Twenty Bees, perhaps?) turns it into a completely different song, so much so that he needn’t have told a soul it was a remix, and we would all be none the wiser.
The sound of rain falling leads us out of that and any noises that were going on stop to leave only Alex’s trusty nylon strung guitar and voice on 'Shallow Blue Ocean'. The sound of a truck rumbling along a road interrupts the musical solitude and introduces us to 'Hey (excerpt)'. Spooky voices reminiscent of children shouting in a swimming pool then lead us on to 'Drums, Then Singing, Then Drums Again' which features the vocal talents of Adrian Orange from Thanksgiving, and his girlfriend, Meghan, as well as Alex and Milly. Alex then shifts back from abstract musician to singer/songwriter for 'Land Ho!' which was a highlight of the last show Alex played in Dundee before setting up home with Milly in Brighton.
Infact, 'Nature' may be the perfect soundtrack for the changes in Alex’s life during the period in which it was recorded. Shifting suddenly from dirty loops and beats to pretty acoustic tunes is a great analogy for the shift Alex made from the dreary Dundee streets to the sunny Brighton seafront. And as closing track 'Alex Versus The Universe' leaves us with the sound of seagulls squawking, you are very much aware that Thee Moths have gone back to nature, but it was a heck of a journey on the way.
For more information on Thee Moths, visit
www.theemoths.co.uk
'Nature' should be released sometime in the Spring.
Linear Mode
