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Apart from the slow-burning, spine-tingling opener Electronic Performers, though, the duo seem reluctant to exploit their remarkable gift for melody, and tunes are too often mangled or left to fizzle out.
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Sadly, Beck's delivery on "The Vagabond" is a tad misguided; his spoken words on "Don't Be Light" are slightly better, but one wishes that he would simply go with the flow and not try so damn hard.
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For better or worse, this is not Moon Safari Redux.
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'10,000Hz Legend' is nothing like 'Moon Safari', then again it doesn't really bear a resemblance to much. Instead, it's a glowing, highly ambitious, quasi-concept album that sees Air spiralling off on a wildly idiosyncratic and brilliantly insane tangent all of their own.
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Supporters have argued that this is " a perfect comedown album". In the sense that you'll feel like you're coming down even if you haven't taken anything, yes.
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It is, like all the best pop music, silly, pointless and thoroughly lacking in high-level intellectual discourse. Thank heaven.
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MixerMaybe the stint scoring music for the acclaimed film The Virgin Suicides helped them segue their too-atmospheric-for-the-room lingerings into something more tangible. [May 2001, p.76]
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Like Radiohead with Kid A, Air benefits greatly here from the extra slack given only to those somehow deemed "artists" rather than mere musicians. Coming from almost anyone else, this album would end up in the trash heap long before it had a chance to sink in.
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The faux naive stance is merely irritating, the bubblegum track merely cute, the cheese rock quotient merely cheesy.
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The resulting mélange doesn’t always work, but the songs on 10,000HZ Legend still succeed often enough to override the record’s occasional shortcomings.
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But once you settle into its desolate vista – and, believe me, it’ll take a few plays – 10,000 Hz Legend becomes just as addictive as its ancestor.
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Spin10,000 Hz Legend offers heavier arrangements, starker contrasts between soft folky orchestrations and hard prog-rock noise, more guest stars, fewer pretty tunes, and several gigabytes of robo-speak. [Jul 2001, p.126]
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Alternative PressThe good news is that in their quest not to make fly-away pop, Air have unearthed a bizarre and dark sense of humor that allows them to subvert and celebrate their new gloomier chops. [Jul 2001, p.59]
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It's nice that 10,000 Hz. Legend sounds very little like Air's masterworks Premier Symptomes and Moon Safari. Unfortunately, it also sounds like Air trying very hard not to be Air.
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On their second proper longplayer, Air project that melancholy forward, depicting romantic recollections from a future world in which "technology" has attained sci-fi levels.
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BlenderThis time around, both Air's jokes and their grooves have lost their grace... [Jun/Jul 2001, p.104]
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Bizarre, surreal, and captivating, this record does nothing expected...
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Happily deviates from the Moon Safari mold of new wave kitsch and sugary pop, guiding the knob-twisting duo's retro-synth sensibilities into a darker, more brooding realm.
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Fans and involved listeners are definitely rewarded with increased dividends after multiple listens, but even they may wish for an album that harked back to the simpler days of the Premiers Symptomes EP and Moon Safari.
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By trying to offer something for everyone, the mostly dull 10,000 Hz Legend has little to offer anyone.
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A tremendously odd hour of music.
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Uncompromising and wildly unpredictable, but only intermittently entertaining.
Awards & Rankings
User score distribution:
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Positive: 26 out of 29
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Mixed: 1 out of 29
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Negative: 2 out of 29
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Jan 19, 2018Experiental, eletronic and stunning. This album is the best, and remember a good time together with my girlfriend in a beach. Amazing, piece of art.
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Apr 20, 2017
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AlexOct 19, 2007