Well, there was a record-breaking heat wave across the nation on this final Fourth of July weekend of the millennium. Or so they kept telling me on CNN Headline News all day today. Yeah, I was feelin' it. Here in the heart of Chicago, we felt temperatures in the high 90's as gallons of sweat gushed from our pores in a futile attempt to cool our golden-plump, freshly roasted bodies. My living room, a sauna.
In heat like this, there's only one thing you can do: aim a fan at yourself, take a cool bath, and listen to good music. Today, as I found my way into the cold bathtub water (is this creating a nice visual?), To Rococo Rot was there for me. The Amateur View is all part of a new German subgenre of ambient electronica called "squirm." The artists blend analog effects with warm, electronic drones and mechanic percussion for a sound that's unmistakably digital, yet 100% human.
The Amateur View definitely finds itself on the more mellow end of the genre's mellow- to- spastic spectrum. Bands like Schneider TM and Slick Sixty possess a slightly more erratic and unpredictable sound than To Rococo Rot tend to display, but The Amateur View outdoes either of those bands' albums in sheer listening pleasure. The Amateur View seems to draw largely from Brian Eno's early ambient experiments, Ninja Tune-style electronic jazz and minimalist percussion-based outfits like Pan Sonic. This combination of influences is, in its own Pokemon-like way, deadly.
Over the course of 11 tracks, you'll be led through another green world and into a sea of such remarkable tranquility, you'd think you were on a moonbase. The music's underwater, oceanic attributes are perfect for a day in the tub, lounging in your temperature-controlled environment, dreaming of a swim in a rural Minnesotan lake. It shall whisk me away. It shall whisk me... Yes...
