Album Review--Goldfrapp "Seventh Tree"

It’s been eight years since the duo of Alison Goldfrapp and Will Gregory released their first album as Goldfrapp: Felt Mountain. Its release coincided with the height of my Ennio Morricone phase and the first thing I noticed in hearing Felt Mountain was the similarity to the great film maestro. Of course, it turns out that Gregory is a film composer and a devotee of Morricone, so this wasn’t all that surprising in the end. Still, the album was enchanting. The complexity of Gregory’s backing music, full of filmic themes and emotion, was great. But the sheer haunting beauty of Goldfrapp’s voice with her obscure lyrics and odd singing style, wrapped around a latter-day Marlene Detriech persona, was highly stimulating, mentally and otherwise. They saw some success from “Felt Mountain,” but it their next two albums, “Black Cherry” and “Supernature,” that sent them up the charts.

Starting with 2003’s “Black Cherry,” Goldfrapp took a big risk in turning the ethereal sounds of their debut into a synth-infused disco album. The risk turned into reward with a few dancehall hits, but it was quite a departure from the types of music I normally listen to. Still, I spun it again and again out of respect for the band and the album wound up really growing on me. It doesn’t show Alison’s vocals off as strongly as “Felt Mountain,” nor is the backing music as lush or interesting. Still, it was significantly more successful than the first album, and this would continue into their third release. 2006’s “Supernature” is a great pop album. It carries a lot of the dance aspects over from “Black Cherry,” but essentially nothing from “Felt Mountain” remained in the sound. Instead, it is glam all the way. Disco mixed with a T. Rex sound and Marc Bolan style lyrics, it was again not something I would ordinarily own but the songs are infectious and it became one of my most listened to albums of the past couple of years. “Supernature” went platinum (incidentally, the first album that I would buy to go platinum since Nirvana’s “In Utero”) and, currently, you can’t watch a television show without seeing a commercial featuring one of the hooks from this album. You can hear the songs in ads for Verizon, Revlon, Diet Coke, Target, Gameboy, a bunch of video games, etc. The album was a surprising success and, even more shocking, is still as good as it is with its mass appeal sound.

This brings us to “Seventh Tree,” which Golfrapp released last Tuesday. At this point, my mode of buying new albums is almost always through downloads but, for some reason, I pre-ordered the CD. I was lucky because, though I didn’t have it on its release day as I’d intended, I received a heavier than normal package in the mail. In the package was the CD along with a DVD, a mini songbook with hand drawings, a poster, and a series of postcards. Honestly, I don’t care about most of this stuff, but that’s not the point. I would have received none of this had I downloaded the album, and I appreciate the artists’ attempt to make the hard purchase worth my while. I paid more than I would have from Itunes, but it was worth it all the way.

Seeing the cover of the album, I was intrigued as to what I’d hear. Each album was significantly different than the last, so I expected nothing else. The cover is a soft-focus picture of Alison Goldfrapp in the forest. My first thought was that I was about to hear some long-lost Fairport Convention album, for better or for worse, and the first song nearly confirmed this. “Clowns,” with its acoustic guitars and lush string arrangements, is a huge departure from anything Goldfrapp has done in the past. Gregory’s mixture of downbeat electronic sounds and pastoral acoustic sounds is almost folksy, but this English folk opener is misleading. The album is much closer to “Felt Mountain” than either of the other albums, but brings a whole new set of influences to the table. Gone are Morricone, Debbie Harry, and Bolan to be replaced with Serge Gainsbourg, Julee Cruise, and The Beatles. It’s like a pop album recorded in the early ‘70s unearthed and remixed with modern electronic techniques. The music, understated as it’s ever been, is still extremely full and deep, but its softness belies its complexity. Most importantly, never before has Alison Goldfrapp been able to express herself so fully with the sound of her voice. Her tones are amazing and the lines she sings are subtle and intelligent, with just a hint of the self-aware shallowness that her previous two albums have expressed. It’s not my favorite album; it’s going to be hard to top “Felt Mountain,” one of my favorite albums of the decade, but it is a solid effort all around.

Above (it was supposed to be below but, apparently, this isn’t possible), though it’s past the season, a video Christmas wish from Goldfrapp…Oh, baby Jesus, he’s not just a foetus….