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Rating: Three years after the unlistenable and pretentious "Medulla," Björk Guðmundsdóttir returns on May 7, 2007, with this latest work, "Volta." She retraces her steps the ice banshee, that is, into the experimental pop most congenial to her and which has brought her a certain commercial success.
This time she self-produces and engages in various collaborations, including Antony Hegarty of Antony And The Johnsons, drummer-saxophonist Brian Chippendale of Lightning Bolt, Malian musician Toumani Diabaté, percussionist Chris Corsano, the Chinese Min Xiao-Fen, player of the pipa (Chinese lute), Mark Bell, pioneer of house music and IDM, a fully Icelandic brass section, and a host of electronic engineers. Compared to the introspective and crepuscular "Vespertine" with its crystalline and fairytale sounds, the album seems a return to earthly passions, primordial sounds, and the "dirty" sound as the Icelandic sprite likes to define it. "Volta" is a cacophonous album, based on an almost excessive use of brass and percussion, noisy and acidic electronics, tribal rhythms, and forays into hip hop and world music.
Earth Intruders, which will be released as a single, is a track far from being straightforward and easy to listen to, going beyond mere electronic pop dance. It gives an almost claustrophobic feeling when listening. It's a thick wall of dense and screeching electronic sounds, every empty space is filled, rhythms and drums of devastating impact, a muffled and distorted voice alternated by somewhat childish and sharp trills typically Björk. Bizarre the closing with trombones and tubas creating maritime siren-like effects with various tones.
The brass is still in the foreground in the solemn Wanderlust, used against a backdrop of muted and harsh tones in conflict with each other to which the cybernetic effects of the synths perfectly adapt, and in the third track, The Dull Flame Of Desire: a wonderful duet with Antony Hegarty, a song high in romantic content, never stereotypical and banal, enriched by inspired vocal performances and a vast array of relentless tribal percussion, advancing in a crescendo for the grand finale.
Innocence is a devastating and highly acidic explosion of stomp cadences and electronic effects that seem to want to scratch and slap. The rhythmic and melodic setup, like the vocal part, makes one think of a kind of post-nuclear third-millennium Big Time Sensuality. I See Who You Are is a successful experiment of traditional Chinese music thanks to Min Xiao-Fen's pipa with warm and minimal sounds and Björk's voice optimally utilized in a melodious and silvery counterpoint.
Dramatic and insinuating is Vertebrae by Vertebrae, classically structured with sophisticated and syncopated rhythm, where the brass section shines with its own light, insistent and very dark, while in Pneumonia the occasion arises for the horns to showcase themselves and lead Björk throughout the piece, performed with great emotional intensity and made even more evocative by the rain effect.
Hope sees the effervescent performance of Toumani Diabaté on the kora, the Senegalese lute, with Björk on the clavichord in a delightful and crystalline pop-world piece. But Declare Independence looms like a disastrous explosion: it is a highly acidic techno-hardcore and electroclash track that hits hard like Björk's demented screams never so hysterically frenetic. One of the best tracks on the album.
The album closes with the short My Juvenile, ready to tone down the excessive tones of the previous sulphurous track and featuring Antony Hegarty again as a partner of the little Icelander. This interpretation by the two artists is splendid too, in a minimalist track instrumentally, but rich in refined and complex vocal balances by Björk.
Volta is presented as a well-made and idea-rich work, perhaps a bit excessive and redundant in the arrangements, but with the courage to propose something interesting and quite varied from a stylistic and sonic perspective. I consider it an itinerary through primordial sounds tied to mother earth, ancestral, with an ancient and traditional flavor. Perhaps "Volta" will not be easy listening enough to have a huge following and does not present itself as overly challenging and experimental to be indigestible; yet it remains a stimulating and creative work, which certainly redeems the Icelandic artist from the misstep of "Medulla" and brings her back to more approachable and credible dimensions.
Tracklist Lyrics Samples and Videos
01 Earth Intruders (06:13)
We are the earth intruders
We are the earth intruders
Muddy with twigs and branches
Turmoil! Carnage!
Here come the earth intruders
We are the paratroopers
Stampede of sharpshooters
Come straight from voodoo
With our feet thumping
With our feet marching
Grinding skeptics
Into the soil
Shower of goodness coming to
End the doubt pouring over
Shower of goodness coming to end
We are the earth intruders
We are the sharpshooters
Flock of parachuters
Necessary voodoo
I have guided my bones through some voltage
And love them still
And love them too
Metallic! Carnage! Furiocity! Feel the speed!
We are the earth intruders
We are the sharpshooters
Flock of parachuters
Necessary voodoo
There is turmoil out there
Carnage, rambling
What is to do but dig
Dig bones out of earth
Mud graves! Timber! Morbid trenches!
Here come the earth intruders
Stampede of resistance
We are the cannoners
Necessary voodoo
And the beast with many heads and the arms rolling
Steamroller!
We are the earth intruders
We are the earth intruders
Muddy with twigs and branches
Forgive this tribe
We are the earth intruders
We are the earth intruders
Muddy with twigs and branches
We are the earth intruders
We are the earth intruders
Muddy with twigs and branches
We are the earth intruders
Muddy with twigs and branches
We are the earth intruders
Muddy with twigs and branches
Marching
We are the earth intruders
Marching
March(...)
02 Wanderlust (05:51)
I am leaving this harbour
Giving urban a farewell
Its habitants seem too keen on God
I cannot stomach their rights and wrongs
I have lost my origin
And I don't want to find it again
Whether sailing into nature's laws
And be held by ocean's paws
Wanderlust! relentlessly craving
Wanderlust! peel off the layers
Until we get to the core
Did I imagine it would be like this?
Was it something like this I wished for?
Or will I want more?
Lust for comfort
Suffocates the soul
Relentless restlessness
Liberates me (sets me free)
I feel at home
Whenever the unknown surrounds me
I receive its embrace
Aboard my floating house
Wanderlust! relentlessly craving
Wanderlust! peel off the layers
Until we get to the core
Did I imagine it would be like this?
Was it something like this I wished for?
Or will I want more?
Wanderlust! from island to island
Wanderlust! united in movement
Wonderful! I'm joined with you
Wanderlust!
Can you spot a pattern?
(relentlessly restless)
04 Innocence (04:27)
I once had no fears
None at all
And then when
I had some
To my surprise
I grew to like both
Scared or brave
Without them
The thrill of fear
Thought I'd never admit it
The thrill of fear
Now greatly enjoyed with courage
When I once was
Untouchable
Innocence roared
Still amazes
When I once was
Innocent
It's still here
But in different places
Neurosis only attaches itself to
Fertile ground where it can flourish
The thrill of fear
Thought I'd never admit it
The thrill of fear
Now greatly enjoyed with courage
When I once was
Fearless
Innocence roared
Still amazes
Untouchable
Innocence
It's still here
But in different places
Fear is a powerful drug
Overcome it and
You think that you can do
Anything!
Should I
Save myself
For later
Or generously give?
Fear of
Losing
Energy
Is draining
It locks up your chest
Shuts down the heart
Miserly
And stingy
Let's open up : share!
When I once was
Fearless
Innocence roared
Still amazes
Untouchable
Innocence
It's still here
But in different places
06 Vertebræ by Vertebræ (05:08)
Up on the toe
There is a view
Up on the toe
And the spine
Straight and erect
Hungry and curious
Up on the toe
Looking forward to
The air is thinner here
She came here
To lose face
Got down on her knees
The beast is back!
On four legs
Set her clock to the moon
Raises her spine
Vertebrae by vertebrae
Up on the toe
Looking
I have been filled with steam for months, for years
Same old cloud, claustrophobic me
Let it burst like old train sounds
Make them leave me nature
Vertebrae by vertebrae by vertebrae
My arms ooze out of my shoulders!
And the arms ooze out of my shoulders
I curl my tail inwards
I set my clock on the moon
Vertebrae by vertebrae
[x3] Please release this pressure of me
Let off some steam
07 Pneumonia (05:14)
Get over the sorrow, girl
The world is always going to be made of this
You can trust in it
Unless you breathe in
Bravely
I adore how you simply surrender to high
And your lungs
They're mourning
Teepee-style
All the still-born love that could've happened
All the moments you should have embraced
All the moments you should have not locked up
Understand
So clearly
To shut yourself up
Is the hugest crime of them all
You're just crying after all
To not want them humans around
Anymore
Get over the sorrow, girl
08 Hope (04:02)
Here's my version of it, eternal whirlwind [x3]
What's the lesser of two evils:
If a suicide bomber
Made to look pregnant
Manages to kill her target
Or not?
What's the lesser of two evils?
What's the lesser of two evils:
If she kills them
Or dies in vain?
Nature has fixed no limits on our hopes
What's the lesser of two evils?
What's the lesser of two evils:
If the bomb was fake
Or if it was real?
Here's my version of it
Eternal whirlwind
I have fostered since childhood
Well I don't care
Love is all
I dare to drown
To be proven wrong
09 Declare Independence (04:13)
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Start your own currency!
Make your own stamp
Protect your language
Declare independence
Don't let them do that to you
Declare independence
Don't let them do that to you
Make your own flag! [x4]
Raise your flag! higher higher! [x6]
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Damn colonists
Ignore their patronizing
Tear off their blindfolds
Open their eyes
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
With a flag and a trumpet
Go to the top of your highest mountain!
Raise your flag! higher higher! [x6]
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Declare independence!
Don't let them do that to you!
Raise the flag!
10 My Juvenile (04:13)
Down the corridor
I send warmth
I send warmth
Down the staircase
I send warmth
I send warmth
Thank you for, again
To get to be able
To send warmth
To send warmth
Perhaps I set you too free
Too fast
Too young
But the intentions were pure
But the intentions were pure
My juvenile [x3]
I truly say
You are my biggest love
I clumsily try to free you from me
One last embrace to tie a sacred ribbon
This is an offer to better the last let-go [x3]
The intentions were pure
My juvenile
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Other reviews
By lovi
"As soon as I listened, it seemed to me to be genius, intense, powerful..."
"Unfortunately... 'Volta' tires, especially in the pieces where she revolutionizes herself too much."
By The_dull_flame
Volta is the most adrenaline-fueled and daring album of her career, a cauldron of magic and beauty.
The spell of the album is unique: listening to it for the two-hundredth time feels like the first.
