Zero 7 – Yeah Ghost

Zero 7's fourth, YEAH GHOST, starts with the ambient "Count Me Out," an abstract piece that perhaps signals a new direction for the duo. And when "Mr McGee" comes in, there is indeed a change, just not one heralded by the intro. Instead, they go in a much more electro-pop direction. It's almost... funky. With blues guitar! "Swing" and "Pop Art Blue" on the other hand, go for folk stylings instead, and "Everything Up (Zizou)" is just plain odd, name-checking author Haruki Murakami and Detroit house mainstay Moodymann. But in a fascinating move, "Ghost Symbol" enters glitchy IDM territory, almost veering into dubstep with its time-stretched vocals and titchy rhythm. But the electro-blues return (with a definite hip-hop influence) with "Sleeper," only to follow up with the Sigur Ros-inspired "Solastalgia." And "The Road" has hints of gospel in it, while the final track, "All Of Us" suggests some post-rock leanings as well. So not just one new direction, but several.

In their fourth album Yeah Ghost, Zero 7 brings to the table a variety of styles and a slightly new direction. At 11 tracks in length, the album is somewhat short however they still manage to bring a diverse amount of music in the span of their album. Pieces like Count Me Out and Solastalgia have an ambient feel to them, in Mr. McGee, Medicine Man and Sleeper they provide a more pop like style, All of Us has a powerful drum beat with IDM and ambient styles mixed in and Ghost Symbol has a very eerie and abstract sound to it. However despite the move away from downtempo in those pieces, they all have the beautiful melodies and rhythms that are the trademark of Zero 7. They also maintain their older downtempo style in Swing, Everything Up, Pop Art Blue and The Road. The vocals that compliment the production all provide great emotion to back up the themes they successfully portrayed throughout their music.

Fans of Zero 7’s past work will likely enjoy the music that reflects their original styles but may be put off by their change in approach with Yeah Ghost. And at 11 tracks in length, the album is short and this may be unsettling as well. However I applaud the stylistic and musical changes they’ve made and that they have shown they can bring even more types of music to the table and have it still maintain its quality.

Well, like the other review i am too dissapointed but not just a bit but A LOT.
This album is the kind of album you might listen maybe once in a month and always on MP3 (forget about buying the CD). I listen Zero 7 since the 2001 release Simple Things and for me they went downhill from there, maybe The Garden was a relief since Whent It Falls but this one is so poorly crafted, not only you dont hear nice and loud basslines and nice guitar riffs, you have to make an effor catch the Zero 7 style on it plus the record has 11 songs well 9 actually since tracks 1 and 9 are nothing, why this? they didnt have any more songs to put?
My feeling is that this album was made to win the US market and stay trendy with nowdays music, its so electronic it hurts!
Another thing is that everything i read was about the singers on this album make in it sound bad, i think Sia is not here coz she heard the album and decided not to get involved in this forgetable thing they gave us.
Thanks for your time, Liffarome from Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Zero 7's first album 'Simple Things' was a true gem. Then i went head over heels over to get the follow up 'When It Falls'. After those i went on to discover other things and forgot Zero 7 for a while when it just popped in my head recently and ed that i had forgotten. So i decided to check out what they have done since then and funny enough, and in good timing, they just have released their 4th album "Yeah Ghost". (As i write this i had yet to hear "The Garden".)
So i decided to this give it a listen and see if the boys were up to date and have maintained their superior production skills.
However i was left a bit disappointed with it. First of all, "When It Falls" had loads of fine vocalists on it, this one was rather loaded with annoying ones. In the end, the singers gave the vocal tracks a rather commercial pop feel to them and was just painful to listen too. Only "The Road" was comfortably for my ears. Some of the production of these tracks is a bit Electro-ish and contributed to mess up the picture more.
The instrumentals are the best ones, but there are few of them and they get left in the shadows by the overwhelming vocal tracks.