There is a song on Echo Other, the new album from Australia’s All India Radio, that sounds like the first day of the end of an ice age. It’s brief, with an overwhelming sense of warmth, like the soundtrack of rebirth. They call it Sunshine Briefly. It’s a fitting title. In fact, most of the songs on Echo Other sound exactly like their labels would suggest and vice versa. The names alone, like Tropic of Unicorn, The Quiet Ambient, Ghost Dirt, and Endless Highway should tip you off right away on what to expect here. In fact, the only thing that may catch you by surprise is how competent A.I.R. is at doing what they do. It’s a prime example that you don’t always have to break the ground that you stand so firmly on top of.
Echo Other is music you can ignore or completely drown oneself in with equal ease. A.I.R.’s brand of downtempo, ambient soundscapes are vast, expansive, and intricate, while staying simple and tender through the combination of electronic and acoustic elements. The title track’s synth heavy intro gives way to a sweet bassline and simple acoustic rhythm bathed in shoegaze guitar noise, phasers, and a computer voice straight out of OK Computer or at least my old Speak and Spell. The Time, Song of the See, and Whistle, are basically acoustic, indie-pop guitar instrumentals spiced up with washes of electronic noise, spastic keyboards, chill beats, alt-country leads, angelic female accompaniment, and in the case of the latter, even a horn part. Four Three layers twangy guitar and siren song seductive vocals over a badass bass heavy groove, but it’s the addition of perfectly arranged strings that really bring it together. Slow bass notes lead the way on The Quiet Ambient before the strings return to compliment a mellow guitar riff, high hat heavy beat, and what sounds like an E-bow solo towards the end. It’s the sound of awakening, awash in the lure of your dreams.
Mexicola, like much of Echo Other, calls to mind the scene depicted on the album cover; a barren, expansive, desert landscape littered with marquee road signs that could belong to long deserted fast food stands or cheap motels on a seldom used highway. A low lying sun, or perhaps a full moon, engulfs the setting in a hazy, almost monochromatic light. It’s a futuristic chillout in a lost highway ghost town. New Age-Old West. Better grab your headphones.
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