I first heard Air from that bull-run commercial advertising jeans. Of course, I didn't know it was Air at that point. All I knew was that the song playing during that 30 seconds was perfect. Later, while browsing at Barnes and Noble I checked out an Air cd at their listening station and was pleased to learn that the song was on that cd.
A few months after discovering who Air was, I was again at Barnes and Noble. On the bottom of one of their displays was a cd titled City Reading. The artist was Air Baricco, and I had no reason to suspect any affiliation with those dudes from the jean commercial. Upon listening to the cd I was drawn in by the spoken words in Italian and the interesting mix of acoustic guitar and electronica backing music. It was a while later that I found out that the group, Air Baricco, was Air providing music with Alessandro Baricco, a novelist, doing narraration with some material from a recent book.
My love of that unique cd prompted this purchase. Talkie Walkie has a terrible title, a pretentuous cover, and a bonus dvd with a live performance they regard "a film." It's a good thing there is some interesting music on this cd, or I'd be close to writing them off as just another product of hype.
What drew me to City Reading was the way electronica and acoustic guitar were mixed to create a textured backdrop of music. It's no surprise then that my favorite tracks on Talkie Walkie utilize simular aural bliss.
Track one, "Venus," starts off with a pounding piano and a punctuated acoustic guitar strum. I am a sucker for a real piano and "Venus" deals in spades. It is probably my favorite track on the cd.
That is followed by "Cherry Blossom Girl" which is a lot more electronic. There is a guitar plucking in the back of the music, but the rest sounds like something I would hear on a sappy Pet Shop Boys album. In general, a lot of Air's vocals on this album remind me of something that I should be hearing from Pet Shop Boys.
Article comments
1 - Mark Saleski
this is interesting Theory, because i've got Air's "Moon Safari" and love it.
...but i hate Pet Shop Boys!
2 - Bethany
I've just recently gotten ahold of Talkie Walkie, and I feel the same way as you about most of the songs. "Run", while full of those redundant lyrics, is the one I tend to play on repeat.
Anyway, I know this is an older article but if anybody happens to come across this comment, you MUST listen to Moon Safari. It's Air's 1998 CD, and personally I found it to be much better than Talkie Walkie. If you can't find the CD, at least find "Talisman" (track 5 on the CD) online somewhere and give it a listen. It will possibly blow your mind. =)
3 - uao
To be fair, Air is an electronica duo, and one shouldn't go into an electronica album looking for organic acoustic instruments. I don't think you were 'looking for' them, but if you were, it would've left you a little dry. And it's not deep, lyrical 'sit-down' music; it's designed for dance or chill-out rooms or pop radio.
That said, I'll say Moon Safari is one of the warmest electronica albums ever, with plenty of tasty organic instrumentation. And Talkie Walkie is really good too; "Mike Mills" (named after R.E.M.'s bassist) is an elegiac postoral/baroque keyboard workout that sends shivers down my spine, I think it's one of the most gorgeous instrumentals I've heard in recent years.
Air, who is French, is among my favorite pop-oriented electronica acts, right up there next to the very similar UK duo Zero 7.
Moon Safari is the better of the two.
PS: I can't stand the Pet Shop Boys, and I've tried repeatedly. Fortunately, Air has never sounded like them to me. But I suupose it's how the listener approaches it; we seem to have come at this ones from completely opposite directions.
Interesting article though, Theory, and your complaints do make sense too; they're an interesting act, and it's interesting to see how people react to them differently. Oh, and I also first heard Air on that commercial; I then checked out their catalog.