An experiment in entertainment, according to founding father Casey Spooner. An audiovisual extravaganza. Trance opera. Electrotrash. Call it what you will. It's difficult to place with a phrase.
As mono-sensory entertainment becomes increasingly fossilized, a performance art called Fischerspooner takes the concept of music video and transforms it. Certain filmmakers, like Michel Gondry and Chris Cunningham, have created art that successfully couples sound and image to the point of inseparability. But sadly, the White Stripes have never put on Lego suits for a show, and Bjork still shows up to performances suspiciously nonrobotic.
But Fischerspooner's act is always on. The music video is performed live with high-calorie indulgence that puts Madonna to shame.
Brainchild of Warren Fischer (music) and Spooner (vocals and lyrics), the group is considered the godfather of electroclash, a new movement merging music, performance art, dance and fashion. Kind of like theatrical DIY techno with 80s roots -- one leg stuck in punk, the other in new wave and both hands reaching for glam goth operatic orgy.
Electroclash is either a trend or a revolution. If it's a revolution, Fischerspooner is its Che Guevara, with some help from a multimillion dollar contract with Ministry of Sound. If it's a trend, Fischerspooner won't matter in a few months anyway, since the music media frequently manifests symptoms of ADHD. But whose fault is that? Maybe it's not quite right to think of Fischerspooner as a music act in the first place.
Instead, perhaps it's counter-intuitive to review Fischerspooner's album with the visual elements in absentia. But "#1," like a pretty good movie soundtrack, stands on its own as an interesting, though incomplete, musical endeavor.
The album, originally recorded in 2000, has been re-released by Capitol Records with two new songs and some bonus remixes. The single, "Emerge," is gaining popularity fast in the U.K. and has been remixed by at least a dozen DJs and electronic outfits so far. Who knows if it will ever make it big over here -- American radio seems to have a few tricks left up its sleeve (Norah Jones?).
The sound is dark. Deadpan. A dearth of emotion. Synths reminiscent of 80s-style electronica. Pulsating bass lines, pounding drum machines to be listened to loud. Not so exciting musically, but for "#1," what works is the build. Most tracks, "Emerge" and "Sweetness" especially, manage to maintain painstakingly controlled simmers before at last going full-boil, keeping ears on edge until the first big sound explodes satisfyingly.
Placed between the feverish "Sweetness" and the infectious "Emerge," "The 15th" takes the tempo down a notch with vocals that are actually sung amid a harmonic depth missing in some of the faster, darker songs. The only other midtempo track is "Tone Poem," the prettiest on the album, organized around a few calming synth tones eventually joined by drum machine, raising the stakes just a tad before the music dissolves quickly to an end. Spooner's voice remains quiet and awed as he worships the "sanctuary
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