Caribou
Andorra
The realization that very little is actually that revolutionary and new is a very quaint one. The realizer usually comes to this sentiment as if discovering it for the first time, when in fact he's been surrounded by the sentiment since the Beginning (seriously, God gave Adam a woman, only to have Adam's sons grow up and discover there were already women elsewhere. Drag about losing your rib, dawg.) If he's lucky, he moves through emotional response to the same old shit, through analysis of communal response, through deconstructionist appreciation of the 'play' between all that same old glorious shit that means so much to so many each it comes around. If he's unlucky, he smokes a lot, grows his hair out, listens to Coal Chamber, and makes out publicly with some really aggressive girl with self-esteem issues. Against this backdrop of have's and have not's Caribou's Andorra is decidedly one of the lucky ones.
It’s dance music, but you put it on when you’re done dancing and ready to sit around and stare at some cards or some people in a dim room. It’s synthetic, but begs to be identified with times gone by, disco vibes, and pretty songs named after girls… You want I should carry on like this? It’s something new, but sounds like something you heard before, except you can’t get over that newness, only like that timeless old stuff, and it’s all only relative, isn’t it. Discuss history of band name and artist’s gradual exploration further and further back in pop music; try something conceptual like writing from a fictional character’s point of view, or make a character out of a real person. This album is mostly original, and for that, the TFO recommends it. At number 25, you’re not here for fully realized ideas and heavy lifting. You’re here to agree or disagree, you’d prefer a concise write up as this isn’t the top ten, and you’d prefer to have the trivialization of complex ideas left to the names and brands you recognize. Fair enough. Check out Caribou’s Andorra, friends and neighbors. We liked it more than Feist.
-Josh Woodbeck, 2008
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