Artist: Banco De Gaia
Title:
9th of Hearts
Label:
Disco Gecko
Released:
7th October
This
release is Toby Marks A.K.A. Banco De Gaia's ninth studio album and
features
special guest artists, from Pink Floyd’s Dick Parry, Zero 7’s
Sophie Barker, The The’s James Eller and No-Man’s Tim Bowness.
The
9th of Nine Hearts is a celebration of the spark in all of us: the
concept of love itself. Fusing ambient, psychedelia, art rock and
acid house, each track evolves naturally into the next, with love the
starting point to them all.
The
album starts with 'Nine Hearts' which begins rather quietly with
ambient strings and shuffling fx into somewhat of a crescendo
before a gentle piano is introduced and is soon followed by the
vocals of Tim Bowness which adds a slight rock opera feel to the
piece and
is inspired by the love in friendship. This is followed by the recent
free download 'Burn The Witch' which fuses rock drumming with ambient
dub and documentary spoken word.
'Warp
and Weft' is a Floyd'esque slice of ambient electronica which
features an ethereal vocal that adds to the calm beauty of the piece.
This is followed by 'Le Foucauld' where tribal drums lead you to into
an eastern bazaar and has somewhat of a celtic folk vibe to the mix
to get your feet a tapping. The
world fusion continues with 'No Hablo Italiano' a fusion of tribal
drumming, sweet guitar licks, synths and vocal snippets which
presents an overall Mediterranean feel.
The
next track 'Is-Is Loves Ankh-An-Atum' sounds somewhat like footsteps
through a misty port despite the obvious reference to the Egyptian
deities. However, the reference soon becomes apparent with the Arabic
vocals and flutes that transcends through the piece and leads us onto
to more Floyd'esque sounding synths. Following on with 'And So We
Dream Of Futures Lost' which begins with spoken word that leads into
a deep orchestral piece of ambience with gentle piano, indistinct
voices and other field recordings from nature before angelic voices
are employed to complete the piece.
The
album then takes a shift in direction with '91' where applause leads
us into a retro sounding piece of acid
house which lifts samples from early Banco cassette releases and
features vocals co-written and performed by Sophie Barker. The mood
then swings back to ambience with 'The Princess And The Sky Goat'
which utilises birdsong amongst an eerie drone before the plodding
kick drum, melodic tones (with a retro ambient dub feel reminiscent of the Orb's 'Blue Room') and Dick
Parry's sax is introduced.
Following
on with 'Midnight Sun' another ambient piece with ethereal vocals
that brings you nicely to the closing track 'This Heart' where the
piano takes centre stage over lapping waves, seagulls and indistinct
chatter.
To
summarise this album should appeal to fans of Toby's work in some
respects it's focus is more on the ambient than the global and is
very introspective. However, the quality remains and going on the
live band performance at Whirl-Y-Fayre is still warmly welcomed after
all these years.
Reviewed
by Woodzee
Pre-order
of
vinyl and cd @ http://banco.co.uk/shop/
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