Afro Celt Sound System – Volume 2: Release

It has been so long since I have listened to this that I forgot how great it was! The mix is tremendous, and the soundstage is wide. The songs are pretty great too. I'm a sucker for anything with Sinead O'Conner vocals, and this drew me to it hook, line and sinker. Such a pleasure to listen to.

You know, with a bit of perspective the exhausting ammount of downtempo releases at the end of the 90's, and downtempo "world music" among them all, with that Pandora box that Outcaste records (greatly) opened with their compilations and artists, and Peter Gabriel's label among the most prolific, becomes not only tiresome but even selfparodic. A group like "Afro Celt Sound System" is so obviously honestly named that, at first, you barely forgive that their releases give exactly that: afro-like percussions, celtic touches like echoed pipes everywhere, and electronic touches. Some I-cannot-identify-which-african-language vocal hooks too and some exotic instrumentation add to gentle loops and melodies, sometimes nearer to trance, sometimes nearer to chillout.

But this time it works, because it's well done. It's not very different to a classic Banco de Gaia tune, but slightly more classy. It's not as inventive as Nitin Sawhney or Martyn Bennett, but it's danceable and catchy. The programming in Black Cat is just wise and epic. Amber, so stereotypical in its chilly atmospheres and reverbed voices, clicks and works when the male voice sings in English. The percussion bridge in Hypnotica and ending is fascinating, and the almost safri duo b-side that is Riding the Waves makes you move gently your feet without making you feel you are in a cheap club.

So, "Release" becomes, after all, a good summary of the gentle world electronica intentions more than a decade ago. It's unashamedly new age, like trying to be mathematically cool and beautiful, a companion to any 30-something dinner with friends at home, but it also works as music... and after all few times keyboards, tablas, acoustic guitars, samples and drums have blended so well.

2016 EDIT: I was a bit too harsh on this, wasn't I? Anyway, one interesting thing with Release is that it was a mixed audio/data cd with an app that allowed you to play with loops and do your own afro celt sound system song. It was great, but I my sister and me feeling a kind of a letdown as, from then on, the music in the CD sounded like just loops. Though obviously they are not.