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Foley Room

by

Amon Tobin

 
Foley Room
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Avg: 4.0 (231 ratings)

Brazilian harvests the infinite variety of the old world to create something utterly new.

  • We Say...

    Review by David Stubbs

    Brazilian ex-pat soundtracker and beatmaker Amon Tobin has always been particularly fixated on the sampling aspect of contemporary electronic music. However, for his latest, perhaps greatest album, Foley Room, he's cast his net out still further, into ambient and field recording. Tobin's hardly the first person to do so, of course, yet Foley Room is unique in its blend of “found” sounds, whose original identity is often obscured beyond recognition, acoustic instruments and all the state-of-the-art cutlery of 21st-century electronica. Harps, strings, drones, ghostly, ancient Wurlitzers, even the sound of chickpeas being strewn across drumskins all help make up the fabric here. Tobin has harvested the infinite variety of the old world to create something utterly new.

    Opener “Bloodstone” features the Kronos Quartet, a group who have always sought out every possible interface between the “classical” and the modern. Here, they create an unsettling, unsteady weave, with a mixture of preplanned, processed and improvised playing, whose emphasis is adjusted according to the distance of the mikes. “Esther S” is ethereal, ectoplasmic even, with its unearthly, revving motions — Tobin himself describes it as “modern day surf music.” He's at unusual pains to describe the methods and origins of his work in the sleevenotes, as if to encourage other, would-be music makers. “Horsefish,” featuring the sweetly diaphanous harp work of Sarah Page is enhanced by its treatment, a great example of electronic gilding of the lily being a good thing. The engines of “Straight Psyche” seem to cut out as it enters a wormhole into a recess of long-neglected riffs and sonic jetsam, broadcast long ago and now washed up in space. But the tumultuous floorfiller “Always” pulls back nicely to the centre of the dance action. In every sense, it's an exemplary album.

  • They Say...

    Review by John Bush, All Music Guide

    Perhaps tiring of the invisible soundtracks playing in his head, Amon Tobin delivered a video-game soundtrack Chaos Theory: Splinter Cell 3 in 2005 and then hit the streets and studios, with microphones in tow, to produce 2007's Foley Room, an exercise in "field" recording. ("Foley rooms" are, apparently, the sound-effects chambers used by those in film.) Of course, anyone expecting crickets and hollers will be on unfamiliar ground, but those who are already aware of Tobin's penchant for spacious productions and sounds previously unheard in nature will know exactly what to expect. His stated aim here was to bridge the divide "between music that was based purely on sound design and tunes that were written to physically move people." But that's nothing new for him -- since the beginning of his career, he's been one of the best producers at manipulating found sounds into more-or-less danceable songs. Helping him on his quest is a large cast of collaborators, including Kronos Quartet, harpist Sarah Page, and Stefan Schneider of Music A.M. and To Rococo Rot. The music is suitably impressive, and shows -- as it should -- a far wider range of moods and textures than Tobin's work in the past. With good reason, the most adventurous tracks here ("Horsefish" and "Big Furry Head") are also the best, showing Tobin stretching himself beyond the usual electronica brainmelt into more progressive territory. [A Ninja Tune edition with a bonus DVD includes about 20 minutes of footage showing Tobin and crew gathering their sounds.]

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