pistachio home

Album Review

Continuing the turn of the century trend of '80s nostalgia, New York City electroclash trio 46bliss turn down the genre's modern electronica elements in favor of a near-total immersion in circa-1981 New Order, Depeche Mode and Orchestral Manouevres in the Dark synth-pop styles. What's slightly odd about this album is that unlike a lot of their electroclash contemporaries, David Cooper and Jack Freudenheim don't strive for period accuracy in their arrangements and instrumentation, so that synth lines that sound like they should be played on a Minimoog or a Prophet V are instead handled by state-of-2002 equipment, which gives Pistachio Home an odd, productive tension. The album's one drawback is that of the 15 songs (plus inconsequential remixes of the singles "Hallelujah" and "Boy Behind the Veil"), the most memorable are covers of the Beatles' "Across the Universe" (given an intriguingly psychedelic, almost dub-like treatment) and Melanie's Woodstock anthem "Lay Down (Candles in the Rain)." Of the originals, the standout is the excellent "The Road To Mandalay," which marries a soaring melody that sounds like one of Dave Gilmour's Pink Floyd songs to an arrangement with the ambient-pop grace of Brian Eno's "On Some Faraway Beach." Unfortunately, too many other tracks on Pistachio Home sound like rejects from one of those '80s nostalgia compilations.