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Temper

by

Benoit Pioulard

 
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Avg: 4.0 (135 ratings)

Ambient folk ... for lack of a better term

  • We Say...

    Review by Alex Naidus

    Much lip service has been paid to the amorphous term "ambient" in indie-rock circles recently. Everything from the dreamy guitar-rock of Deerhunter ("ambient punk") to Grouper's heavily processed atmospherics has been pegged with the word. It can be a frustratingly misleading catch-all, used too often to describe anything with the semblance of gauze or echo. Benoit Pioulard's latest, the beautiful and odd Temper, is the rare album that actually deserves the tag, since it uses that oft-overlooked element: actual ambient sound.

    Benoit Pioulard is the project of Michigan native Thomas Meluch, who wrote and played all the music on Temper. Residing at the heart of the album are his hushed, deceptively simple folk songs. Brushed with reverb and featuring a multi-tracked Meluch harmonizing with himself, the songs by have an enchanting quality all by themselves that turns almost dizzying with the layers of staticky, buzzing field recordings added. The result is a sound that, despite the meticulous production and processing, feels like it captures something wild — pretty ditties, covered in bees.

    Temper has sixteen tracks, a handful of which are essentially segues: short, instrumental pieces stuffed between the more (relatively) traditional folk numbers. These are the most explicitly ambient passages on the album, dominated by barely discernable, haunting sounds (submerged church bells, a steady rain, nasally insect calls). Songs like "The Loom Pedal," though, are the most impressive (and affecting) on Temper, weaving together sheets of noise and Meluch's airy delivery into undulating, otherworldly tapestries.

    Meluch has claimed a fascination with the sound of nature and tape decay — Temper shows his mastery in synthesizing this impulse with a knack for more conventional songcraft. With remarkable subtlety, he has delivered the holy grail of experimental pop music: a set of songs that are as hummable as they are impossible to classify.

  • They Say...

    Review by Heather Phares, All Music Guide

    Temper lives up to its name, balancing the cloudy beauty of Benoît Pioulard's music with more form and clarity and melding his folk, pop, and electronic leanings even more seamlessly. Where Précis seemed to drift from song to song depending on which way the wind blew, these songs move of their own volition: "Ragged Tint" opens Temper with shivery, rippling guitars that are much more urgent than any of Pioulard's earlier music. This nervy undercurrent pulls the album in unexpected directions, as when the chords of "Brown Bess" slide up steeply, turning the song from serene to tense. However, Pioulard's melodies are as gentle as ever, and would be lullingly lovely if there wasn't so much surrounding them. Temper's arrangements swirl, flutter, and sparkle like a just-shaken snow globe, setting off "Idyll" and "Ahn"'s crisp pop perfectly. These songs could have appeared just as easily on Précis as they do here, but other tracks move Pioulard's songwriting forward -- often by looking back: the lilting melody and prickly strumming of "A Woolgathering Exodus" have a chamber-folk cast, and "Modèle d'Éclat"'s massed harmonies and dense organ sound beautifully anachronistic. Temper expands on Pioulard's creative sonics as well: "The Loom Pedal"'s textural depth adds to its misty reverie, layering a rainstorm recording over distorted vocals and crystal-clear acoustic guitars. Pioulard is equally gifted at creating uniquely outdoorsy sound worlds as he is at crafting hook-filled songs; Précis' airy interludes were just as vital to the album as its more full-fledged tracks were. Temper has fewer of these pieces, but they're just as effective at giving Pioulard's densely constructed songs room to breathe. "Sweep Generator" and "Cycle Disparaissant" suggest vivid yet blurry images with their whorls of distortion and drones, while "Ardoise"'s watery chimes and chirping frogs are weathered with a patina of static. At times, Temper's focus means it doesn't have quite as much sweetly mysterious atmosphere as Pioulard's earlier work, but when the final track, "Hesperus," evaporates like waking from a dream, it's proof that there are plenty of moments to get lost in here.

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