M83 Dead Cities, Red Seas, and Lost Ghosts Album Review

M83
Dead Cities, Red Seas and Lost Ghosts
2003


Strange musical happenings with beautiful melody interlacing the feel create an astounding piece of musical work, which opens with a short number featuring a robotic voice. As the odd sensation given by the symbolic speech combined with its inorganic origin washes over, the next track starts as the real opener for the album. Keyboard fills break the coastline with waves of moving glitters of arpeggio before drawn out and thoughtful electro organs drown out what remains of the initial excitement.


As the sound crisps out into yet another track, more build-up pushes the energy back into driving position. A viewpoint of passing scenery enters the imagination as repeating and crossing over melodies canonise over a sea of distorted cymbals. Run into Flowers brings a vocal line into play for the first time, muttered lines that hide behind the overpowering mix of string and drum repeat and increase in amplitude until they fit more confidently in the mass of sound.


Dreamy movements of composition sway from the milder side to the more emotional one until the repeating amalgams of music draw to a close, revealing a sudden drop in energy with a beautiful and ghostly pipe organ track which pushes out the creases and straightens out the sides. In Church is a moment of relaxation in what is quite a busy CD.


The pulse is raised with the onset of America, a manic sensation of frantic voices brings new power to the so far tranquil listening experience. Now there's some dark energy being added to the experience, perhaps tensions in life need to be accounted for no matter how out there perspective can become. Timing and sound sample work together to make an artistic expression, the music is minimal and emotive but the communication of sensation is deeper than before. The album is entering our psyche from a new angle, filling out from the initial pleasant beginning.


There's a lot of space in this work, the progressions are fast but plentiful which means a tidal flow becomes more like a swinging pendulum than an oceanic sway from one to another. Every track has a second dimension which draws on something different to its original feeling, but the work itself remains focused on human introspective qualities that are represented in clever melodies and synthesised sounds which seem to tap into the nerves dictating the flow of life's dreams.  
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