The High Llamas – Talahomi Way: Album Review
In my original description of the album, I had said “the music was like the music that plays in movies from the seventies or eighties that plays in introductions.” That’s still a great description.
There are many other reasons why this album deserves mentioning though. There is a lot of feel-good music with very interesting instrumentation on this album. While the sound is vaguely familiar, The High Llamas manage to keep it modern and interesting (for a while). But the effect of some of the songs wares off after some not-so-extensive use. Of course not every song can be great, but the first two tracks only have maybe a replay value of three times or so. However, after getting through (see skipping) the first two tracks, the album gets much more interesting for a while. The ambience, the atmosphere, and most importantly the instrumentation, bring this album together – especially the percussion.
Now percussion normally holds music together, keeping it in time and whatnot, but this percussion HOLDS the songs together. While all the parts compliment each other tremendously, the percussion is so rich and diverse at times that I have to take a second to appreciate it for all its worth.
Unfortunately, it’s not all praise. “Fly Baby, Fly” is like a combination of a few of the other songs on this album. So artists have a definitive sound, but this is pushing it. The words are great, but the music seems a bit… repetitive. It’s almost as if every time I wrote something good about this album, it would get worse, but afterward would come right back to provide me with more entertainment. “Fly Baby, Fly” is followed by “Angel Connector” – a brief interlude, but one of the best parts about this album. Now it is hard to keep everything different after eight albums, Talahomi Way being the ninth. The last song uses a very similar percussive beat as “Take My Hand” and “Woven and Rolled” for about half the song. This is just so hard to get past after pointing out how important the percussion is to these songs. Pop music gets away with sounding the same as a bunch of other stuff all the time. This double standard is silly, but if an album’s selling point is in its uniqueness, it has to stick to being unique. It also lacks long-lasting appeal, and seems to be only a situational sound.
Score: 7.5/10
Our Final Say: This album will only appeal to certain people, and while I’d love to recommend it, there are just too many tracks that I can hardly stand. Stream it first to know if you like it, but I must say, buying only certain tracks (unless there’s some sort of super-deal on the full CD) is recommended for this CD.
If You’re Cheap (or listened to my advice) – Our top three (3) tracks to buy: “Woven and Rolled”, “A Rock in May”, and… I don’t know. Listen to the album and take your pick. If “Angel Connector” weren’t only a minute long, I’d recommend that.
~ David Thorne