Dani Siciliano - Likes
[K7]

For anyone familiar with the genre-bending click-house styles of Matthew Herbert, one vital area & dimension that makes these opuses worth revisiting again is the resplendent mellow ever so slightly jazzy tones of Dani Siciliano. Constructed from Miss Siciliano's viewpoint after learning how to sample, sequence & record her musical ideas into something concrete.

Opener 'Same' resembles Laurie Anderson's 'O Superman'. Siciliano contributes heavily to the framework of the track, fragments of chopped up voice come & go and are looped like vocal treacle while percussion sounds, preferably the hi-hats, are quite obviously mortal rather than machine.

'Walk The Line' is another stand-out, Siciliano warns us not to get too close in the kind of steely strict order that could break a man forever, her detatched almost monotone disinterested ice-maiden voice becoming rather intimidating. The crunchy almost hip hop beats mark this out as a possible single.

'All The Above', a duet with Mugison, is an amorphous ambient lullaby. Mugison sounds weary & resigned while Dani swoons & serenades away like an angel being slowly cocooned into a gosammer stupor. It's here you realise that she has a remarkably broad range, able to concieve mild inertia through lulling you into a sense of security.

'She Say Cliche' is fluffy weak sub drill n' bass, it taps & rattles but doesn't do a great deal. While attention-retaining, challenging, intriguing and fresh you begin to hope for some divine intervention. Siciliano's voice is tampered with so much that you're almost tempted to try and undo it all like a giant shoelace.

This is a lady that has a phenomenal amount of ideas but can't always channel them into digestible chunks. It's like everything has spilled out, failed to be mopped up and the contents of someones subconscious mind have been scooped up and deposited into one untidy pile rather than individual designated ones.

Last track 'Remember To Forget' undoes the damage though, being a lovely mellow torch-sung organic & orchestral jazz rumination. This is an unmistakeable attempt to recreate the live feel of Herbert's recent 'Goodbye Swingtime' big band album.

This album acts rather like a comedy-tragedy mask, there are 2 obvious sides to her persona but they seem to be constantly in conflict. A perplexing album, with moments of beauty amongst the dispassionate indifferentness. Worth checking out for 3 or 4 tracks alone, the rest is a challenge & certainly easier to like than love.