stylistberlin Album Review: Late Night Tales mixed by Friendly Fires  

Label. Late Night Tales
Artist. Friendly Fires
Title. Late Night Tales
Format. CD & 2x LP & Digital Album
Cat.Number. ALNCD30
Release Date. 5 November, 2012
Distribution. Worldwide via EMI & Balance (Central Station) & South Bound (New Zealand) & Beatinc (Japan) & Love Da Records (Hong Kong), NEWS (Benelux)
Domain. www.latenighttales.com

Friendly Fires, that is the trio from St. Albans, suburb of London: Ed MacFarlane, Edd Gibson and Jack Savidge. They played at this year’s Berlin Festival and were one of the must-see highlights. Their compilation for LNT is full of disco and warm sounds.

Track List

01. Junior Boys “Under The Sun“
02. Renee “Change Your Style“
03. Joe Simon “Love Vibration“
04. Dennis Parker “Like An Eagle“ old 80ies, some tv
05. Space “Carry On Turn Me On“
06. Iron Galaxy “Attention Seeker“
07. Bibio “Don’t Summarize My Summer Eyes“
08. Stereolab “Black Arts“
09. SBTRKT “Hold On“
10. Friendly Fires “Why Don’t You Answer? (Exclusive Sting & Eberhard Schoener Cover Version)“
11. Sonna “One Most Memorable“
12. Laurel Halo “Embassy“
13. DJ Sprinkles “House Music Is A Controllable Desire You Can Own“
14. Grouper “Invisible“
15. Melody Echo Chamber “Endless Shore“
16. Cocteau Twins “Cherry Coloured Funk“
17. Slowdive “Shine“
18. Olivia Newton John “Love Song“
19. Nils Frahm “Over There It’s Raining“
20. Benedict Cumberbatch “Flat Of Angels(Pt.1) Exclusive Spoken Word Piece“

Selected Track by Track Review

01. Junior Boys “Under The Sun“

No words needed. It speaks fort he compilation to start with a tack by Junior Boys, a band that get a lot of love by a huge audience. A perfect opener!

02. Renee “Change Your Style“
Renee is described as Dutch proto-house artist. It is a track in the old fashioned
What the heck is proto-house, you may ask? Call it what you want. I think for most of the fans it can be categorized into the wder “disco“ section – and for those “be-more-specific-about-the-genre-nazis“: a nice article about the genre: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Disco

03. Joe Simon “Love Vibration“
Grammy award winner Joe Simon is features next on this compilation, with his release of 1978 – I guess a lot of you were not yet born then – that originally came out on the label Spring Record. (Actually, I am not sure if it is Love Vibration or Love Vibrations – help me out here!)
As the title implies, it is all about love vibrations. Listen for yourself here.

04. Dennis Parker “Like An Eagle“
This is described as “anthemic porn-disco“ – I am not sure what that means, but I guess it could be described as warm and sexy track ☺ a bit of the old 80ies, a bit of a tv soundtrack feeling, you can search like an eagle through the city, when you listen to the track. I think about sunny evenings, riding a car through wide city streets…

05. Space “Carry On Turn Me On“
This is a disco funk track by French group Space from 1977 with Madeline Bell vocals: http://www.madelinebell.com

06. Iron Galaxy “Attention Seeker“
This is a 2012 release, but works fine in between the old goodies. I have no clue how Friendly Fires managed to put a disco house track in between these disco gems and still make the mix work, but they did.

Check out Canadian Adam Hodgins of Iron Galaxy: https://soundcloud.com/adam-hodgins

07. Bibio “Don’t Summarize My Summer Eyes“
This art-pop track by bibio is groovy and warm. I think this review describes it perfectly:
“Don’t Summarize My Summer Eyes” is a fabulous wordplay and a marvelous instrumental. Bibio generally uses his voice like an instrument, not really giving precedence to the vocabulary except when the words warrant comprehension. This and many other Bibio songs evoke a barren city, a pale sunlight, a glinting body of water on the verge of solidity (specifically the beginning and end of “Don’t Summarize”). They are luxuriously bleak. They put me in a lonesome, observational mood, but I don’t mean this in a bad way. In fact, let me rephrase. Some Bibio songs make it perfectly acceptable to be alone and observational. Or they highlight that lonesomeness that is latent in everyone. By http://www.indieball.com/tag/ambient/

08. Stereolab “Black Arts“
Another art-pop track in the mix. Have not heard from Stereolab ever since the High Fidelity OST I think, which I absolutely love to listen to, even now. This kind of music was big more than a decade ago in Korea.

Love the lyrics!

Surrounded, the world on top,
Disconnected, digging my soul,
Holding my breath to repossess.

I need somebody, I feel so lonely
(Need somebody, need somebody, need my body)
This time I need somebody to be family,
Some to inspire, to die in fire.

My heart (my brain), my heat, my sweat, my feet.
I need my bones and my blood too,
Need somebody in my body

09. SBTRKT “Hold On“ feat. Sampha

SBTRKT (feat. Sampha) – Hold On from ben boullier on Vimeo.

This track is just WOW. Check out Sampha on soundcloud, amazing!!! https://soundcloud.com/samphamusic

10. Friendly Fires “Why Don’t You Answer? (Exclusive Sting & Eberhard Schoener Cover Version)“
Friendly Fire’s ’78ies classic cover of Eberhard Schoener’s original. Found a recording on youtube:

11. Sonna “One Most Memorable“

This is a kind of track I listen to when I am getting a Shiatsu massage or doing yoga… Relaxing, but not really my thing to hear at home.

12. Laurel Halo “Embassy“
Friendly Fires bring back a bit spice into the compilation with this track: trance-popish melodies and a mezzo soprano voice singing, also not one of my favourite picks on the album.

13. DJ Sprinkles “House Music Is A Controllable Desire You Can Own“
Back to more modern melodies, I would say. I am not sure about the arrangements of violin and claps and beats of this one.

14. Grouper “Invisible“
The track is described as „acoustic minimalism“, I think it is quite boring, as the two tracks above are.

15. Melody Echo Chamber “Endless Shore“
Another 2012 release that reminds of Arcade Fire’s style of powerful guitar lines and a high voice giving lightness to the heavy pop-rock sound. LIKE!

16. Cocteau Twins “Cherry Coloured Funk“
This track is described as “shoegazing daydreams“ ☺

Check out the lyrics:
Beetles and eggs and blues and pour a little everything else
You steam a lens stable eyes and glass
Not get pissed off through my bird lips as good news
Still we can find our love down from behind
Down far behind this fabulous, my turn rules
Beetles and eggs and blues and bells and eggs and then blued
Beetles and eggs and blues and pour a little everything else
You steam a lens stable eyes and glass
Not get pissed off through my bird lips as good news
You’ll hang the hearts black and dull as the night
We hanged your pass and start being as you in ecstasty
Still being cried and laughed at before
Should I be sewn in hugged I can by not saying
Still being cried and laughed at from light to blue
And should I be hugged and tugged down through this tiger’s masque
And should I be sung and unbroken by not saying
You mind not saying
He’ll hang that heart’s black and dull as the night
Still being cried and laughed at from behind me, from gains
We hanged your pass and star being as you in ecstasy
Still being cried and laughed at from behind me, from gains
Should I be sung and unbroken by not saying
Still being cried and laughed at from behind me, from gains
Hugged and tugged down through this tiger’s masque for key

One can argue about the interpretation of the lyrics, but it goes well after Melody Echo Chamber, for sure.

17. Slowdive “Shine“
This shoegaze band from 1989. Haven’t heard sounds like this for a while.
“The British music press—particularly NME and Melody Maker—named this style shoegazing because the musicians in these bands stood relatively still during live performances in a detached, introspective, non-confrontational state, hence the idea that they were gazing at their shoes.“ (wikipedia)
Found this old video for you to watch:

Slowdive – Shine from albatross38 on Vimeo.

18. Olivia Newton John “Love Song“
I don’t need to write anything about this. It is a classic and goes perfectly with the flow of the compilation, leading slowly tot he end of this

19. Nils Frahm “Over There It’s Raining“
German neo-classical coposer Nils Frahm gets his spot on this compilation. A wonderful piano piece.
http://www.myspace.com/nilsfrahm/music/songs/over-there-it-s-raining-46009079
Reminds me of Yiruma-esque lightness, it is an emotional piece of work that is wonderfully underlining the voice of Benedict Cumberbatch:

20. Benedict Cumberbatch “Flat Of Angles(Pt.1) Exclusive Spoken Word Piece“
“Tucking you in, Late Night Tales begin a new bedtime story ’Flat Of Angles’ narrated by none other than star of ’Sherlock’, ’Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy’ – and of next year’s Star Trek sequel and The Hobbit films (and admitted Friendly Fires fan) –Benedict Cumberbatch.“
If this is Pt.1, I am looking forward to Pt.2!

Comment
This Late Night Tales Mix by Friendly Fires is in one word “sexy“. Compiling loads of old-fashioned grooves with modern interpretations of the disco movement back in the days.
Here are the guys talking about the compilation:

Opinion
This is definitely not one of those 0815 mixes you we used to. Friendly Fires proved they can pick out tracks of contemporary big names that have this 80ies nuance in it. Incredible, how Friendly Fires mixed up names like Junior Boys, SBTRKT, Olivia Newton John and wrapping the mix up with a spoken word piece by Benedict Cumberbatch.
This Late Night Tales edition compiled by Friendly Fires is a perfect companion for a cozy evening with friends.