Atoms For Peace - Amok
Release date: February 26, 2013
Thom Yorke is cool like Call Me Maybe is catchy. It's one of those indisputable things. Despite his years of desperately trying to convey to us that he is a brooding artist, Yorke flips the switch. Granted his attitude on Amok is thanks to the ever cheerful Flea.
Flea has a knack of spreading his groove around. This time, with Thom Yorke, it proves to be successful. It's very "sci-fi/indie rock". Amok comes off as sounding quite arty. The type of music you would hear in the basement art gallery in the meat packing district where tiny appetizers would be passed around but no one would take any, because everyone is way too damn cool.
Atoms For Peace was not created on a whim. Like every of Yorke's projects AFP needed to be executed to perfection. Meaning, waiting about four years - yes, four years - for the world to hear anything by the collaboration was necessary. Atoms For Peace is not just made up of Thom Yorke and RHCP's Flea, longtime Radiohead producer Nigel Godrich (keyboards), Joey Waronker, and Brazilian percussionist Mauro Refosco are also hard hitters. Amok is clearly not just the Thom Yorke show (despite how I've described it so far). The artists carefully selected to work on Amok have thrown in as much guts as Yorke.
The beats on Amok come off sounding Radioheady at times, but pick up where Radiohead leaves off with Flea's constant funkified bass. It all plays almost as though it is is one track, with quick breaths every five minutes or so. It's a hip, psychedelic trip. It becomes quite simple to look past the lyricism, which scream Thom Yorke by the way, with so many groovy rhythms going on. The sensation is almost hypnotizing.
This "new" project is diverse straying from what you might expect from Yorke and Flea. The inventive quality, though, is what will make Amok a lasting piece of (art) work.
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