stereolab: sound-dust

BY NATHAN LITTLEFIELD

The trademarks are all here: horns, muted drums, cymbal brushes. Letitia Sadier and Mary Hansen coo almost unintelligibly over soft guitars and keyboards interspersed with occasional vestiges of Krautrock looping.

To Stereolab's credit, Sound-Dust is often pleasing. It is not, however, exciting. Brilliance flashes throughout but never reaches full burn. "Captain Easychord" boasts languid, catchy near-hooks that run throughout the song. "Double Rocker" is equally strong, with French vocals sliding slowly over inventive, catchy instrumentation.

Unfortunately, for every standout song, the disc contains two that will almost surely be relegated to makeout mix tapes for pretentious 17-year-olds attempting to intellectualize themselves into their dates' paint-spattered jeans. Stereolab's lounge influences are credited with resurrecting the genre from its Las Vegas nadir, but Stereolab seems close to repeating lounge's descent into high camp and low relevance. Worse still than the soporific "Baby Lulu" is "Gus the Mynah Bird," the clunkiest lyrical example yet of the band's Marxist politics. Statements like "self-determination should be a fact, not essentially a right" should appeal to any of the above-mentioned teenagers, but they are a lyrical and musical—not to mention logical—dead letter. Ideology aside, the same goes for about half this album. (Elektra) 

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