Category: Caribou

Caribou – Andorra (2007)

posted by record facts

Andorra is the fourth studio album by Canadian musician Dan Snaith, released under the stage name Caribou. It is Snaith’s fourth album and his second as Caribou, following The Milk of Human Kindness. It was released on August 17, 2007 .

Daniel Victor Snaith (born 29 March 1978) is a Canadian composer, musician, and recording artist. He has released 10 studio albums since 2000 and has recorded and performed under the stage names Caribou, Manitoba, and Daphni.

As Dan Snaith became an accomplished producer with his Manitoba and Caribou albums of the 2000s, the breathtaking vitality of his early work gave way to music that may have been more accomplished, but was never as interesting or as fun to listen to.
Andorra is just the kind of break with the past that he needed after 2005’s relatively lackluster The Milk of Human Kindness. His first album on Merge, it’s less a collection of innovative sounds and productions (like The Milk of Human Kindness) and more an album of songs, united by his motivations and desires.
These tracks are first and foremost songs — and not just because Snaith is singing a bit more. There’s less of a “programmed” sound, although the productions are dense with tape cut-ups, layered harmonies, and various percussion lines threaded through the mix.
And the sheer strength of the material is immediately apparent when the opener, “Melody Day,” reveals itself as the best moment in Snaith’s career. First of all, it sounds like it was recorded in 1966 by a British band that just missed the cut for the Nuggets, Vol. 2 box set, recalling ’60s touchstones like the Move or Soft Machine. Not strictly a throwback, though, its ineffably crisp and kaleidoscopic production style ranks with the best of Dungen or Fiery Furnaces or Animal Collective (which is high praise indeed).
Andorra may be a bedroom record, but it certainly doesn’t sound like a bedroom record; it has the energy and intensity of group participation, and that makes it Snaith’s best yet.

Track listing

Melody Day – 4:11
Sandy – 4:10
After Hours – 6:15
She’s the One – 4:00
Desiree – 4:12
Eli – 3:03
Sundialing – 4:40
Irene – 3:38
Niobe – 8:51

All tracks are written by Dan Snaith

Companies, etc.

Licensed To – City Slang
Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Caribou
Copyright © – Caribou (3)
Pressed By – EDC Blackburn Ltd
Published By – Chrysalis Music
Published By – Copyright Control

Credits

Layout – Matt Cooper
Mastered By – Noel Summerville
Mixed By – David Wrench (tracks: 1, 2, 6)
Photography By, Art Direction – Jason Evans
Written-By, Producer – Dan Snaith (tracks: 1 to 9), Jeremy Greenspan (tracks: 4)

Notes
Released: August 17, 2007
Genre: Psychedelic pop, electronica, neo-psychedelia, dream pop
Length: 43:00
Producer: Dan Snaith

Label – City Slang/Merge

Caribou – Our Love (2014)

posted by albums data-base

Our Love is the seventh studio album by Canadian musician Dan Snaith, released under the moniker Caribou on October 6, 2014 by City Slang worldwide and October 7, 2014 by Merge in North America and South America. It is Snaith’s fourth album as Caribou, having released his previous album, Jiaolong, as Daphni in 2012. It features collaborations with Jessy Lanza and Owen Pallett.

The album reflects on the success of Snaith’s breakthrough album, Swim, four years prior. The lyrics are more personal and reflective than his previous albums, influenced by the birth of his daughter. It is an electronic album with R&B and hip hop influences.

Electronic artist Dan Snaith, working as Caribou, produced brilliantly abstract albums for more than a decade, moving from the glitchy weirdness of his 2001 debut, Start Breaking My Heart, into more delicate mergers of organic sounds and electronic production, with his 2007 standout album Andorra and its more psychedelic follow-up Swim in 2010. The move toward the dancefloor that was hinted at on Swim is brought into full focus on sixth full-length Our Love, a collection of ten powerful grooves that still manage a bit of Snaith‘s trademark psychedelic production.

The underwater-sounding loop of electric piano and slowed-down vocals that begins album opener “Can’t Do Without You” lingers for a while in a soft, welcoming way, setting the tone for a good minute and a half before the song’s beat drops, offering the most good-natured take on a house track imaginable. Covered in aquatic phaser effects, the song builds to anthemic heights before settling back into softness for the end. Snaith‘s falsetto vocals throughout the album seem to find the middleground between James Blake‘s moody mysteriousness and Arthur Russell‘s curious wonderment.

Standout tracks like “Silver,” or the lovely title track, find Snaith‘s airy vocals floating atop a web of steadfast beats and murky vocal samples. Unexpected snippets of string samples, ’80s-sounding electronic percussion, and disconnected voices come in and out of the picture, with songs seamlessly blooming from blurry bedroom productions into full definition dance tracks. Snaith‘s ear for pop hooks keeps even the harder-edged tunes here catchy, as with the hypnotic but ever melodic forward push of “Your Love Will Set You Free.” All told, Our Love stands as the most straightforwardly danceable Caribou album to date, but holds on to both the experimental bent and composition-minded musicality that helped build the project’s one-of-a-kind sound world.

Track listing