Quantcast

Call for Feature Essays About Any Aspect of Popular Culture, Present or Past

Music
cover art

OceanLab

Sirens of the Sea

(Ultra; US: 5 Aug 2008; UK: 21 Jul 2008; Canada release date: 2 Sep 2008)

The debut full-length collaboration between charting UK dance act Above & Beyond and singer Justine Suissa was not only recorded in Ibiza, but truly captures the theme of the resort culture. That means, popularity aside or even expected, Sirens of the Sea is watered down lameness. All things considered, the instrumentals display a decent variety of somewhat flimsy Sasha and Spooky house, utilizing many overused sounds and formulas from days past (read: a whole lotta “oonce-oonce-oonce”). They are technically solid, but generally quite safe and uninspired.


It’s the vocals that are the main weakness here. Justine’s voice is okay, perhaps falling prey to Autotune a little too much. Her lyrics are seriously lacking, though. She tackles the odd big theme, like the glaciers melting and war at sea, but buries them in a lot of wishy-washy sentimentalism. “If I Could Fly” muses about flying and seeing the world down there, how free that would feel, between pseudo-hippy denunciations of our isolating social nature. It just seems more like she’s telling us what we want to hear rather than what she actually wants to say, with the possible exception of “Miracle” and its call for action on climate change against the tide of religious apathy awaiting judgment day. However, in this context, I doubt partygoers will bother to heed the worthwhile messages. I have a tough time believing this record and I doubt it will beckon that many ships to their rocky doom, but at least it shows some respectable effort to do what they can to improve this situation.

Rating:

Greetings, brothers and sisters. Like you, I'm a fan of music. I spend most of my time researching, investigating, making, and exploring music. Since 2004, my music reviews, essays, and columns have appeared in publications such as Exclaim!, Tiny Mix Tapes, PopMatters, and I've been a Polaris Music Prize juror since 2010. I graduated from Simon Fraser University's Contemporary Arts program with a BFA in music in Summer 2011. I am happy to live in East Vancouver with my sketchy but sweet cat Isobel.


Tagged as: house | oceanlab
Media
OceanLab - Miracle
Comments
Now on PopMatters
A Painting Come to Life: 'The Mill & the Cross' (Short Ends and Leader) [Fri, 4:00 pm]
A Far Too Safe... and Strained... 'House' (Short Ends and Leader) [Fri, 9:00 am]
'Safe House' Is Ersatz Edgy (Reviews) [Fri, 8:06 am]
The 10 Greatest Shakespeare Film Adaptations of All Time (Short Ends and Leader) [Fri, 7:50 am]
  1. 'Nebraska': Bruce Springsteen's 'Heart of Darkness' (Columns)
  2. The 10 Greatest Shakespeare Film Adaptations of All Time (Short Ends and Leader)
  3. Slipped Discs 2011 - Part 1: From 13Ghosts to Friendly Fires (Features)
  4. The Best Games of 2011 (Features)
  5. Not-So-Central Casting: Kevin Smith and the Birth of the Reality Podcast (Features)
  6. The 10 Greatest Movie Spies Ever (Short Ends and Leader)
  7. Slipped Discs 2011 - Part 2: From the Go! Team to the Phoenix Foundation (Features)
  8. Slipped Discs 2011 - Part 3: From Real Estate to Youth Lagoon (Features)
  9. Lana Del Rey: Born to Die (Reviews)
  10. The Top 15 Madonna Singles of All Time (Sound Affects)
  11. Get Off of My Cloud!: 'Collecting' Music in the Digital Age (Features)
  12. Leonard Cohen: Old Ideas (Reviews)
  13. Google and the Production of Curiosity (Marginal Utility)
  14. Carole E. Barrowman’s Authorial Journey to Hollow Earth (Features)
  15. “Don’t Let Me Fall”: Hip-Hop in the Age of Austerity (Features)
  16. Tower Songs: Townes Van Zandt (Columns)
  17. Black Bananas: Rad Times Xpress IV (Reviews)
  18. The Gay Ole Countryside (Columns)
  19. Paul McCartney: Kisses on the Bottom (Reviews)
  20. Of Montreal: Paralytic Stalks (Reviews)
  21. Counterbalance No. 67: John Coltrane’s 'A Love Supreme' (Sound Affects)
  22. The 10 Best John Coltrane Solos (Sound Affects)
  23. A Look to the Past, An Insight Into the Present: The Use of Gender in 'Mad Men' (Features)
  24. Nick Cave’s The Death of Bunny Munro: A Rock Star’s Midlife Crisis or Valid Literature? (Features)
  25. A Tale of How Great Journalism Became Revisionist History: Grambling State U Football (Columns)
  26. Chairlift: Something (Reviews)
  27. Mark Lanegan Band: Blues Funeral (Reviews)
  28. The Asteroids Galaxy Tour - "Heart Attack" (Cosmic Kids Remix) (PopMatters Premiere) (Mixed Media)
  29. The Barbaric (and Poetic) Yawp of Shelby Lynne (Notes from the Road)
  30. After Cease to Exist: The Far-from-Final Report of Throbbing Gristle (Features)
PM Picks
Music Archive
Announcements

© 1999-2012 PopMatters.com. All rights reserved.
PopMatters.com™ and PopMatters™ are trademarks
of PopMatters Media, Inc.

PopMatters is wholly independently owned and operated.
PopMatters is a member of BUZZMEDIA Music, MOG and Guardian Select.