Songs for the Jetset
Vol. III (Jetset)
by Jamie Kiffel
Imagine a sunglare yellow and brilliant red raincoat, green goggle sunglasses, and ankle-high plastic boots skipping down the streets of London. Then imagine those happy clothes bouncing straight through your speakers. The result is Songs for the Jetset Vol. III, a ridiculously happy candybox full of English pop tunes soaked in carefree Quaaludes and love. Hippie-dippy and full of doot-doo-doo’s and la-la-la’s, brainflowers practically bloom backwards into the room when this stuff comes giggling out of the stereo.
The day-glo sound that the six artists on this disc create is so coherent, they could easily be a single merry band of pranksters. In fact, the bands here worked together to create what they call “cinema pop,” an Austin Powers-y sound inspired by listening to soundtracks from the ’60s. The result is a flowing stereo head-trip in which the songs seem to conspire to get under the listener’s feet and pick them right up so that the brain can fly.
Tomorrow’s World leads us into this tribute to Mod with the cheerful (if slightly disconcerting) announcement, “You don’t have to wear those. All you have to do is listen!” With that, the instrumentals bubble forth, full of sunshiny sounds ready to send you skipping just a few inches higher than the sidewalk. Daisies‘ exclamation, “Day out, way out, sunshine!” takes the listener higher into the sunnysphere, while Wallpaper‘s round, rolly synths and light, psychedelic guitars send the eyelids fluttering with rainbow butterflies, and Death by Chocolate rings bells in the ears of the unhip with its bizarre spoken vocals, “My friend Jack eats sugar lumps” and “When you walk between the lines on the stairs, be careful that you don’t step on the bears.” Loveletter‘s “Love” takes us into the land of the Maharishi with something that sounds like an electric sitar and tripped-out vibrations. The trip finally grins to a close with Loveletter’s “Sun,” which feels just slightly lifted off of reality thanks to Simon Fisher Turner’s overlapping tenor vocals that sound like he’s coming at you from several directions. “Had a little pain from time to time/ Now it’s time for the sun,” he sings. If you’re also having a little pain, or just want to see colors, switch on the aural sunshine this disc provides, and get glowed.
(www.jetsetrecords.com)
