|
 |
MH-260 Her Space Holiday - XOXO, Panda And The New Kid Revival  Putting some space between himself and the computer that has provided the basis for so much of his recent work, Marc Bianchi has taken the last two years to focus on what got him into music in the first place, writing connective songs and working out the layers of sound he hears in his head. The results are a new persona, XOXO, Panda, and the reinforcement of the feelings of personal and artistic freedom that drive his music. Loose and carefree arrangements of guitar, bass, banjo, mandolin, shakers, glockenspiel, and drums lay the foundation for vocal storytelling sing-a-longs. XOXO, Panda And The New Kid Revival is a brilliant calling card for Her Space Holiday’s newly awakened alter-ego, and a watershed moment in his growth as a songwriter and performer. |
|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Reviews Summary |
| Guitar pop songs that are as charming as they are simple - Rolling Stone / That he can switch up styles so frequently and make solid records says something special about Bianchi - Pop Matters / Melodies have that wonderful undefinable quality that makes you want to hear them over and over... Killer indie pop cuts - Babysue |
| A work of almost overwhelming scope and ambition, Lily Perdida is a kaleidoscopic narrative with 10 different narrators, an array of tricky time-signature changes and a self-contained world of exotica and toy instrument sounds. Opening with the carnival atmosphere of "Lull for Dear Life," this never settles into a single identity, songs being fragmented and changing character several times through their duration, evoking the detail and artistic restlessness of Brian Wilson's Smile more than any of Mark Mitchell's previous work. In particular, the gauzy somnolence of lost classic Come Here When You Sleepwalk seems distant; the sound similarly layered but this time characterised by competing, dissonant elements. The record's sprawling aspirations are its biggest strength – and weakness. Any real sense of the central character is lost under a mass of musical detail. However, the lack of anything to latch hold of means that inspired ideas, like the descent from a snappy rhythm into reverb on "It's Here The Story's Straight" or the bouncy melody spliced into "The Infinite Orphan," flash by on a regular basis. While not as immediate or as purely enjoyable as Come Here ..., this stands as a singularly ambitious release, and quite possibly the only Australian album of the year you'll need to draw a mind-map to follow. - Mess + Noise |
