THE AVALANCHES – NO BAD MEMORIES: REVIEW
THE AVALANCHES
No Bad Memories (Modular)
IN THE AFTERLIFE there should be a special spot for the records that were just what we wanted, just when it was called for. And if this heavenly place exists, there’s an Australian band with a few seats booked in.
If last time around The Avalanches were the friend we definitely needed – the support and back-up, the one saying we will get through this and we’ll do it together, the one we would never have got through lockdown and all that madness without – then No Bad Memories is that friend reminding us we go back a long way, with a shared history, a verbal shorthand, and the ability to bring the joy by simply being here.
And joy is important here.
Almost instant joy too as this is an album of quick moments, with 31 tracks in a totally manageable 52 minutes, some as short as 20 seconds, none breaking four minutes. Yet it doesn’t feel like sugar hits but reconnections that happen immediately because explanations aren’t needed. And like old familiars, sometimes that connection is little more than a glance or a raised eyebrow across the room that says everything and brings forth a smile.
The sleek early ‘70s soul of I Give Everything I Have 2 U, with the aid of British duo Loaded Honey, steps in and out of something a bit more vigorous but no one is uncool enough to sweat, and when they return for Final Credits, it is impossible to resist the urge to form a Soul Train line with anyone standing nearby. The fake ads of Friends Forever and 3D Glass Not Included teeter between spot-on silly and wrongly real, while Haley Joel Osment’s visit in El Dorado TV Spot is the pause the refreshes. Elsewhere, One More Fantasy, where the unlikely presence of Carly Simon adds a sheen of dreamy ‘80s-ness to wibbly wobbly technology, is easily appealing, and there’s a rush of warm pleasure in Magic Wand that might as well be a little love bomb.
I did say joy was important here.
As with 2020’s We Will Always Love You, the sampling foundations remain strong – Total Recall is a glittering collage that keeps turning to the light to reveal a new element; the brisk, tinkling bits and bobs of Together sparkle; Xerox Altalink B8055 is plugged right in – but as might already be clear, guests play an equally important role: machine and human as the balancing twins of our culture. Like the anthropomorphised floppy disk and iPod on the cover, leaning into each other affectionately. Or the way our friends complement and add to us rather than replace bits of us.
The writing that frames and expands these twin poles is sometimes quite superb, whether finding the delicacy within the scurrying beats of Far Away and making the groove irresistible but still only one factor in the appeal of Vida, or nailing the heart-tug within the title track’s gliding progress.
It’s a comfortable space for The Avalanches, now a three-piece of original members Robbie Chater and Tony di Blasi with newcomer Andy Szekeres, and they earn the right to send us away with the creamy croon of the album’s final track, The Pavements Light, which is graced by Haruomi Hosono, a man who’s always understood that gracefulness and heart go a long way with pop music.
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APPLE MUSIC: Listen to The Avalanches – No Bad Memories
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