With Happy Birthday!, the follow up to their fantastic 2005 debut LP Hello Mom!, Germany’s dance music duo Modeselektor continue to perform their Euro-club hypnosis on electronica fans the world over.
Only this time, the songs are much less focused and in some cases simply unexciting. This is mostly due to fact that Gernot Bronsert and Sebastian Szary employ the same hackneyed synthesizer sounds used on their first release as generously (and carelessly) as they do exclamation points in their album titles. They could have taken advantage of the unlimited possibilities their homemade equipment affords them, but they opted to stick to a handful of tones that instead of coming off as a “signature sound” end up being pretty uninteresting the second time around.
Happy Birthday!’s saving grace is its variety of guest performers, most notably Thom Yorke and Maximo Park (On ‘The White Flash’ and ‘(I Can’t Sleep) Without Music’ respectively), who help focus the Berliners’ beats into proper pieces of music. As a whole the record is a tough listen, but the few successful tracks will make fine additions to any DJs kickass club mix.
Only this time, the songs are much less focused and in some cases simply unexciting. This is mostly due to fact that Gernot Bronsert and Sebastian Szary employ the same hackneyed synthesizer sounds used on their first release as generously (and carelessly) as they do exclamation points in their album titles. They could have taken advantage of the unlimited possibilities their homemade equipment affords them, but they opted to stick to a handful of tones that instead of coming off as a “signature sound” end up being pretty uninteresting the second time around.
Happy Birthday!’s saving grace is its variety of guest performers, most notably Thom Yorke and Maximo Park (On ‘The White Flash’ and ‘(I Can’t Sleep) Without Music’ respectively), who help focus the Berliners’ beats into proper pieces of music. As a whole the record is a tough listen, but the few successful tracks will make fine additions to any DJs kickass club mix.
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