Fridge
The Sun
Temporary Residence, 2007
By Sal Hassanpour
We’ve waited six years for a new Fridge album, with only a single compilation track (the tasty “Five Combs”) in the interim. The absence is understandable once you figure out who the band consists of — in fact, that there’s a new Fridge album in 2007 is a minor miracle.
Back in 2001, Fridge guitarist Kieran Hebden’s solo career under the name Four Tet took off on a major level. Fridge bassist Adem Ilhan followed suit in 2004, releasing two full-length acoustic guitar gems so far.
Not only did Hebden invent the “folktronica” sub-genre single-handedly and build a reputation as a prolific and consistently exceptional remixer, but he became an even more accomplished musician when he took steps to ditch the laptop folk aesthetic, delving deep into beats by way of hip-hop and more recently free-jazz, finally emerging as, for my money, the most adept and versatile handler of percussion around.
And the cover of The Sun says it all: Drums! X-rayed and superimposed!
So when the opening title track bursts into a manic, gleeful drumroll from the very first second and doesn’t let up for its entire duration, we’re in happily familiar territory. “The Sun” is a studio worth of drums and some bass lines, but it comes in waves of pure sonic delight, like surfing up the side of a giant, pulsing neon rainbow. Hawt.
Next track “Clocks” is pretty much more of the same, expect some guitar lines are thrown on top in that gentle style British post-rock bands seem to excel at, and it’s as if Four Tet were to remix something off the first two Fridge albums. “Our Place In This” is two acoustic guitars and some smattered tambourine rattles, and is just as delightful for being a blissful ambient chill-out of hanging chords.
The next trio of tracks blend to form a suite, the otherwise impressively-titled “Drums of Life” being a forty-second intro for the by-the-numbers instrumental rock of “Eyelids,” which chugs along minus the happy drums but “Oram” compensates with its manic percussion free-for-all freak-out and for a moment I decide that Fridge are now only at their best whenever they’re channelling Four Tet.
And then “Comets” comes on, and schools me with its hypnotic beat-box snare, chopped up guitar and piano, glowing-algae synth lines and mellow, throbbing bass, and I’m reminded of how great a band Fridge is precisely because they have a sound entirely of their own that stands apart from any of their individuals members’ solo efforts.
The Ornette Coleman sax skronk on “Insects” is The Sun’s “let’s-pretend-we’re-a-free-jazz-band” moment and manages to navigate its way through those dangerous waters, but “Lost Time” is the “let’s-insert-ghostly-folk-vocal-sounds” track and we’ve been here before quite recently with Do Make Say Think, who did this kind of thing more convincingly. Final track “Years and Years and Years…” isn’t the epic, “so long and thank you for the music” moment its title promises to be. It’s a carbon-copy of “Our Place In This” and we’re left wondering if the lack of closure means more Fridge in the future.
So, is this their best album? The Sun’s strengths outshines (mwahaha) its weaknesses but it’s nowhere as consistent as the last two, 1999’s Eph (get the 2002 re-release) and especially 2001’s Happiness. Even so, on the merit of the first three tracks and “Comets,” this star (groan) will be in my Top Five for the year.
