The very first thing that strikes you about this album is how firmly established Balearic has become as a genre, in and of itself. It has been for a long time of course but since Balearic was essentially an anti-genre – pioneered by DJs on the White Island such as Alfredo playing whatever they wanted, whenever the whim took them – the shift to it being a sound in its own right is at once interesting in a nerdish sense, but perhaps even a little disappointing. There is no other word to describe this record, however. It’s certainly all-encompassing in its array of influences from dub to chugging post-punk, even a touch of psychedelia.
What it also is, is a slightly grubby, pleasantly groovy animal. Presumably named after his weekender in the rather picturesque Carcassonne in the Languedoc part of southern France, it harks back to a time when tunes somehow found themselves suited to the dancefloor rather than the other way around. This is not a club record, but parts of it swing along in a pleasing enough way to get the hips a-wiggling. It’s sleazy and it’s steezy, in the best senses of both of those words.
Aided and abetted by long-time collaborator Nina Walsh, the piece as a whole is a swampy, slightly scatter-gun affair. But when things coalesce into the focussed, speaker-abusing bassline of ‘The Last Walk‘ it’s no doubt effective. The quacking wah wah pedal – present over several tracks – seems oddly anachronistic but these ideas are always worth revisiting and chucking into the mix. The forcefully drifting synth line carries things along most pleasingly. And the vocals; the vocals provided by Andrew Weatherall himself? Well, it’s hard to say. They are very post-punk in the gentlest of fashion but they kind of work. Hell, why not? If I had his back catalogue going all the way back to Boys Own, I’d do what the Hell I liked as well.
And an enviable history it is too. From production work including Screamadelica by Primal Scream, of course, to some of the most individual dance records ever made as Sabres of Paradise to the deeper grooves of Two Lone Swordsmen, it’s been quite a career since mucking about at Shoom in the late 1980’s. If anything, one might yearn for a bit more influence from those parts of such an illustrious career but then, not unreasonably, the answer to that may be, “Go and listen to them then.”
It’s an inviting record. It draws you in and benefits massively from being heard on a loud system. However, for the first record under his own name since 2009’s A Pox on the Pioneers it’s a touch underwhelming. For now, this is a growing, wobbly head-nodder. It doesn’t have quite the variety and kaleidoscope of colours and shades to make it completely essential. The highlight perhaps is ‘We Count the Stars‘ with its ominous moans and skittering, starry trumpet. It’s not revolutionary like some previous releases, but then not everything can be.
