Search - Orb :: Pomme Fritz

AMBIENT EXPERIMENTATION

Pieter | Johannesburg | 09/14/2003

(3 out of 5 stars)

"The 9 minute title track with its symphonic overtones opens this charming album with its varied sonic textures and interesting samples. More Gills Less Fishcakes starts of with a strange cacophony of barely audibly voice and loud noise samples cleverly integrated and then turns into a type of eerie bleepfest with discordant percussion, synth whooshes and voice samples. Somewhere in all of this there is a melody. The electronic textures of the opening of We're Pastie To Be Grill You sounds like The Residents before the track evolves into an interesting experiment with human voice samples, only to change again into synthesizers first tinkling and screaming, then gurgling and burping; a track very hard to describe. Banger And Chips provides welcome relief with its dreamlike melody and lilting rhythm, quite a hypnotic and engaging piece of music. The next one Alles Ist Schoen has an atmospheric female vocal and more lovely ambient sounds and flows out on evocative synth strains reminiscent of Autechre. The last short track, His Immortal Logness, has beautiful organ sounds and just a snatch or two of samples. Throughout the album, there is a male vocal sample that refers to electroshock therapy and that ties the whole together thematically, I suppose. Although Pomme Friz has its moments, it does not represent The Orb's best work and is not cohesive enough. I recommend the listener interested in The Orb to investigate the albums Orbus Terrarum and Adventures beyond The Ultraworld to hear the best of this innovative band."