What can be said of day-care center techno? For all of their high-minded explorations of the man-machine principle, Kraftwerk could still entertain any tyke. Hell, the Moog synthesizer itself has an inherent charm for ages 4-7, given its sound that seems edible. And then there's Mouse on Mars-- translating dense poststructuralist theories about rhizomes and "bodies without organs" into what often sounds like Saturday morning cartoon music, circa 2098. LA-based, post-techno wascal Brad Laner (Electric Company) exploits that essence on Creative Playthings.
Laner's 10th album is too antsy to keep any conversation-- it's bound to knock into people with abrupt dissonance but leave furrowed brows and baffled smiles in its wake. Its fructose-poisoned jaunt "A Rainbow of Traction" rudely embodies that element with its panicking music box melodies, feminine "ba-ba-ba-baa" choirs, and a wicked, faux-snake charmer flute that cuts in midway.
Such Fisher-Price psychedelia is a point that Laner has long progressed toward, this time mellowing out the glitches and lopsided song structures to concentrate more on rhythm and melody. His palette: old-school Nintendo Gameboy melodies, acoustic guitars that arise and get decapitated like dandelions in sidewalk cracks, dribbling digital-dub beats, and his own vocoderized android whispers that recall Kraftwerk's most "human" moments. Tackiness pervades, but it's forgivable.
Opener, "Stand Close, Don't Flatter Yourself", sets the template with its seasick dub rhythms and a sudden blast of over-processed guitar as if scoring a melodramatic "game over" screen in a video game. Laner's data-crunched guitar freakouts also liven up the otherwise faceless blip-hop of "Is There Another Door to Door?", the Hendrixian solo on "Crates of Dead Orange Markers", and the Russian-style new wave polka of "Recalcitrant". The aquatic drone duet between guitar and synth in "Jarhead" simply hypnotizes.
Creative's melodrama can be laughably bad at times. "Theme from the Mushroom Shaped Tongue" slaps together a preset-synth orchestra that soundtracks a direct-to-video, late-80s comedy during the scene where the hero is feeln' blue and looking for The Way, namely, "Some crazy idea that just might work!" "Blue's Clues" sappiness wrecks the whiny, "Peter and the Wolf"-style melodies of "She'll Be in Foal Again".
Oddly enough, the best of Creative are a handful of MP3s hidden on the CD. These tracks, (all titled by Laner holding down a key like "aaaaaaa" and "ccccccccc"), have little to do with the album. They instead take on rather mature experiments with chalky guitar noise, glitch-hop and a loop of a woman whispering behind one's back. There is also a 19-minute concert tape from 1998 that sounds like Laner kicking and smacking an acid-fried engine to start. Makes sense.
