Air

Pocket Symphony

Some bands like to thwart expectations, and Air is one of
them. "Spacemaker," the opening of Pocket Symphony, sounds
like a cousin to their instrumental retro-lounge "La Femme D'Argent"
from 1998's Moon
Safari, right down to the electric bass break in the middle. But this
isn't a return to their breakthrough sound. "Spacemaker" really does
pave the way for an almost classically somnolent outing from the French duo.
Air once proclaimed, "In any classical song you can take five seconds of
it and make a loop and you make a great pop song with it." I think they
took that to heart on an album that echoes Debussy, Bach, and Reich, but which
also contains a Beatlesque eclecticism redolent of Revolver. But
instead of the Beatles' Indian flourishes, Air look to Japan, using a
plucked koto on a couple of tracks, but also a zen garden sense of sonic
placement. Although Jarvis Cocker from Pulp and Neil Hannon of Divine Comedy
sing on a couple of tunes—adding some emotional gravitas—Nicolas Godin and
Jean-Benoit Dunckel do most of the vocalizing in their preternatural
Munchkins-on-Quaaludes lisp. Air are known for their chilled melancholy, but the
mood of Pocket Symphony is introspectively somber. Only "Mer du
Japon" rises to a groove, while the rest recline in a luxurious torpor.
That mood works especially well on instrumentals like the minimalist cycles of
"Night Sight" and the Enoesque "Lost Message," with its
circular piano line and ice-sheathed string synthesizers. Pocket Symphony
won't yield any pop hits, but it could be the soundtrack to endless rainy
afternoons. —John Diliberto